THIRD ANNUAL .YEAR BOOK - PART V. 223 



ing for the farmer, the latter is vitally interested in the fair. He wishes 

 to attend it, to take a part or all of his family, to send his boys. He has 

 a right to ask and to expect that it be clean, wholesome, instructive, so 

 that when they return home they will have a feeling that the time 

 and money was well spent. He has a right to expect that the fair will 

 solicit his attendance and that of his family with clean hands; that it will 

 not expose them to unwholesome temptations; that its influence will be 

 instructive and calculated to teach things they ought to know; thar. due 

 provision will be made for their comfort; and that the young people espe- 

 cially will not be lead into acquiring information and habits which they 

 should not acquire. 



While the farmer has a right to expect all this, he sometimes forgets 

 the old maxim that "a stream cannot rise higher than its source," and 

 that the Iowa state fair has its source on the farm. If it falls short of 

 what it would be, the farmer himself and he alone is to blame for it. It 

 is to be remembered that this annual fair is an institution of the state. 

 While it is recognized as belonging largely to the agriculture of the state 

 and its control is therefore delegated to a representative body supposed 

 to be elected largely by the farmers, nevertheless the state itself as a 

 state stands back of it. An admission is charged, and the fair is expected 

 to largely pay its own way; but as its mission is to foster and encourage 

 industries and to afford object lessons which cannot be seen anywhere 

 else, the obligation of the state to stand behind it financially is never 

 ignored by the legislature when properly appealed to. If, therefore, the 

 Iowa state fair fails to be what it should be, if it falls short of what the 

 farmer has a right to expect of it, the farmer himself is mainly to blame. 



Whatever may be its shortcomings, at the present time, it may fairly 

 be said that the Iowa state fair compares favorably with those of other 

 western states. The fairs of Illinois and Minnesota may be said to excel 

 it in some respects, mainly in the provisions which have been made for 

 housing the people and enabling them to see the exhibits to advantage, 

 and the superior advantages they have — one because of its being an older 

 state, and the other because of its location between two great rival cities 

 — to draw a larger attendance. But considered from every standpoint 

 of what a fair should be, the Iowa state fair measures up well. And it 

 should. As an agricultural fair it should excel them all. It is located in 

 the center of the best all around agricultural state in the union. The 

 grounds are of great natural beauty, and well adapted to the purpose. 

 The railroad facilities for reaching the city at which the fair is held are 

 excellent; and it comes at a season of the year when the weather is 

 favorable and when the farmer can leave home for a few days with very 

 little disarrangement of the farm work. 



During the past two or three years the fair has been vastly improved 

 There is room for still greater improvement. Until last year the farmer 

 who wished to even see, let alone get an intelligent idea of the cattle and 

 horse exhibits was compelled to stand around in the sun and struggle for 

 a place at the show ring, elbowing his neighbor, crowding the cattle and 

 giving the judges barely sufficient room to work. Last year the new live 



