24 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



One of the unsatisfied desires of the society has been that of 

 reaching more of the children and young people of the state. 

 We have talked of having horticulture taught in the schools, and 

 we have debated the policy of plant distribution, but nothing 

 definite has of late been attempted in this direction. The success 

 attending competitive essays on horticultural topics presented 

 to the Southern Minnesota Society has suggested the thought 

 that a bronze medal together with a plart premium ofifered by 

 our -society to one successful essayist under sixteen years in each 

 county where the superintendent of schools will agree to act as 

 judge and where a specified number of schools shall compete, 

 might not only turn the thought of thousands of children to out- 

 of-door art but advertise our society among the people that we are 

 wishing to reach. 



In closing I wish to commend the spirit of unity and good 

 fellowship that has for many years pervaded cur councils. If 

 there are any members that are trying to use the society for sel- 

 fish ends, I am entirely ignorant of it, and T can say w^th absolute 

 freedom that I have never been connected with an organization 

 where the rank and file showed more of a spirit of unselfish 

 loyalty to the cause for which it stood ..han our own horticul- 

 tural society. We have had many able and earnest leaders, but 

 without this loyalty of the many, their plans would have largely 

 miscarried. And this spirit of unselfish loyalty appears to be 

 spreading, and I am led to believe that we have crossed the thresh- 

 hold of a period of great progress for humanity, when the spirit 

 of liberty, equality and fraternity will lit*: our whole country to 

 a plane of general substantial prosperity, when the true spirit of 

 Christianity will achieve great triumphs in the hearts of men, when 

 the wrongs and oppressions of the ages sh?ill meet their final fate. 

 We will therefore go on rejoicing in the light of this golden age, 

 in the goodly work which has fallen to our hands, and endeavor 

 to make this gathering count one step in the grand march of human 

 progress. 



