FIFTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART VII. 



619 



Fairfield, Iowa, November 21, 1853. 



"We beg leave to call the attention of the people of the State to the fore- 

 going call from the officers of the Jefferson County Agricultural Society. 



"There is no free State in the Union save Iowa, in which there is not a 

 State Agricultural Society, organized and in successful operation, and they 

 have been recently organized in most of the Southern States. They have 

 been productive of a vast amount of good and no one can estimate their 

 usefulness. 



' 'Is it not time for the farmers of Iowa to be aroused to the importance 

 of such an organization in this State? Shall we be laggards in the race of 

 improvement? Shall the resources of other States be developed, their 

 wealth increased and their people elevated in the scale of intellectual being, 

 and ours stand still? 



Isaac T. Gibson, Salem, Iowa. 



Visitor at the First Iowa State Fair (1854) . 



"Farmers are not the only persons interested in this subject. Every 

 citizen of the State had a deep interest in her prosperity and reputation. 

 Let no one suppose that it is for others to act and for him to remain a quiet 

 and uninterested spectator. 



''We hope to see a large delegation of citizens of every county in the 

 State— farmers, mechanics, merchants and professsional men at Fairfield on 

 the 28th of December, 1853. Come up, gentlemen, and do your duty to your- 

 selves and to the State. 



