152 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



it, the act is the hardest thing in the world to present with justice to 

 the company and to you. I am speaking of my own county now when I 

 say that I do not believe that we could put on a stock show and get by 

 with it. We have got to get the music and the free-act and other features 

 to entertain our patrons. We are situated between two large cities, 

 Waterloo on the west and Dubuque on the east, and it is not difficult to 

 get good free acts, so we went to work and built a good free-act platform. 

 It is raised from the ground, with eight dressing rooms belo\^ 

 ground is cemented, and in the rear there is a toilet. We have the band- 

 stand next to the free-act platform. I don't believe that a band across 

 the track can do the work of playing for the free-acts in justice to them- 

 selves or the perfornxers. We have an amphitheatre 220 feet long, with 

 a front rail six feet high instead of two feet. There wasn't an inch but 

 what was gone over. Some of the farmers doubted the idea that we could 

 ever bring back the stock show, but we did. I went down with men ol 

 the city and picked up two farmers and talked things over; then we went 

 out and visited every stock raiser that is registered in the county, and 

 went after them just as hard as we could. What was the result? We had 

 as good an exhibit as one would want. We built new buildings. That 

 has been done because we have the confidence of the people back of us. 

 As long as I am secretary I will not try to talk what I cannot produce. 

 If you treat your people white, I believe the fair will succeed, and I be- 

 lieve we can do the business, and my motto this year is " simply 

 PATRIOTISM and PRODUCTIVENESS. 



The Chairman : The next matter on the program is a paper 

 entitled "Publicity and How I Handle It," by Mr. E. S. Estel 

 of Waterloo. 



MRl E. S. ESTEL: Mr. President and Members of the Fair Associa- 

 tion: In sitting here at this late hour and watching the interest that 

 you men have in this discussion, I cannot help but call your attention to 

 a meeting I attended just a few night ago. The mercury was down 

 around 16 below'. Of course, we fellows are all interested in the dairy 

 game in Iowa, and I had a man along with me who was very much in- 

 terested and was very anxious to talk. We went out to a little school 

 house in a small town' where we were to hold a meeting. We waited 

 around quite a while for the people, but no audience came to listen to us, 

 only one man. I thought the best thing to do was to give up the meeting 

 entirely, but the other man, as all of these older fellows want to do, was 

 very anxious to talk, so he started out to talk about the dairy cow and 

 the very great advantages of her, and went on for an hour and a half, 

 hard and long, and then I came on with my talk for three-quarters of an 

 hour (don't worry, I ain't going to give that tonight), and after we got 

 all through, as we usually handle these meetings, we say: "Are there 

 any questions' you wish to ask us?" and the man there said: "Yes, there 

 is just one thing 'I would like to know, when will you get through? If 

 you are through, I want to know it, because I am the janitor here of 

 this school house and I want to lock up for the night." 



