130 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
for it is a pleasant outing, not only for the farmer, but for any one who 
wishes to take a week's vacation. We had upon our grounds this year 
close to five thousand people who took advantage of this way of attending 
the fair. The cost is very small, as one can rent a tent and have the 
same put up and taken down; all that is necessary to bring from home 
is sheets and pillow cases. If the increase continues in the next five 
years as it has in the last five years, there will be ten thousand campers 
on the grounds, a^ the fair is fast becoming one of the great educa- 
tional institutions of the state, if not now. 
I would like to see erected on the grounds a cottage from every 
county in the state where the people of a county could register and 
meet their friends. Of all the buildings that have been erected upon the 
Iowa State Fair Grounds in the last few years, none have called out so 
many favorable comments as the new Administration Building that was 
built this year. It not only throws all the offices of the fair together, 
so that anyone wishing to go from one department to another can do' 
so without traveling all over the grounds, but the building with its large 
rotunda and its commodious porches was a mecca for all the people at- 
tending the fair. The placing of new buildings for the future has be- 
come a great problem with the directors and officers of the fair, and in 
every new building that has been erected in the last few years they have 
figured from the increase in the past and judged by the same increase in 
the future that they were building large enough to meet this increase; 
but they have found themselves mistaken. The fair in the last few 
years has been coming with leaps and bounds, until today we have had 
more people on our grounds in one day than the total attendance for 
the entire week a few years ago. To illustrate the increase of entries 
in our stock departments: Two years ago we asked the legislature to build 
a swine barn, to cover three acres of ground and hold three thousand 
hogs. Some of the legislators thought we were crazy, wanting a building 
to hold three thousand hogs; "you will not fill it in twenty years," they 
said. But they were convinced that we did need a building of that ca- 
pacity, and so built it. What was the result the first year the building 
was occupied? that was in 1907; we could not accommodate all the hogs. 
And this year, after cutting down the number of pens each exhibitor 
might have, we turned away close to one thousand hogs. And in every 
department of the fair they were taxed to the limit to take care of 
the entries. 
There are several buildings that the fair needs at this time — machinery, 
dairy, etc. But the most needed building at this time is a new, abso- 
lutely fire-proof grand stand, capable of seating from twelve to fifteen 
thousand people. It seems cruel to see from five to eight thousand peo- 
ple standing in the hot sun all afternoon to try and see some of the 
amusement features of the fair. They are not standing there from choice, 
but from the fact that they are unable to procure a seat in the grand 
stand. 
I have not gone into the financial conditions of the fair of 1908, as 
that will be brought out by the secretary, Mr. Simpson, in his report, and 
in behalf of the members of the board and officers of the Iowa State 
