ANNUAL WINTER MEETING. 57 



pressed with the prevailing ignorance existing among many of 

 our agricultural classes, and the great disadvantage under 

 which these busy toilers labor in their attempts to keep pace 

 with the rapid progress of inventive genius as applied to the 

 new methods of cheaper production and distribution of all 

 classes of farm and garden products, and are properly inquir- 

 ing what will become of that part of the community who are 

 unthinking and heedless of the causation of plant growth and 

 f ruitfulness, and how little they know about the prevention of 

 many diseases affecting the vegetable and animal kingdom, un- 

 less special effort is made in their behalf. 



There are comparatively few, indeed, of our medium, intelli- 

 gent, would-be-progressive farmers and horticulturists who 

 are sufficiently informed to apply many of these useful discov- 

 eries and put them into practice themselves without seeking 

 instruction from object lessons or from teachings of a special- 

 ist who has had advantage of practical experience in his par- 

 ticular profession. 



Never in the history of agricultural and horticultural pursuits 

 was so much being done in our universities and agricultural 

 colleges, and through the medium of the agricultural and horti- 

 cultural press to improve the methods and disseminate useful 

 knowledge among the tillers of the soil. A new era is dawning 

 in the minds of the rural population of our state, and the farm- 

 ers as a class are growing eager for instruction and knowledge 

 of the first rudiments of general farming, tree planting and 

 fruit growing. You may be led to inquire why I think this so. 

 We point with exultant pride to the large number of farmers' 

 sons seeking admittance at our State Agricultural School, for 

 the purpose of receiving purely agricultural and horticultural 

 instruction such as is not given in any other state. Also the 

 increased interest manifested in the urgent request that more 

 plain, honest horticultural instruction be given to our Farmers' 

 Institutes. These two modern methods of giving helpful, use- 

 ful instruction where it is most needed, cannot be too highly ap- 

 preciated and should receive the fostering care of our present 

 legislators, by their wise and generous support, with liberal 

 appropriations for prosecuting this class of work with vigor in 

 every county and farming community in the whole length and 

 breadth of our state, if we expect to take what should be our 

 proper place and station in the agricultural world, as an enter- 

 prising, energetic, progressive people. 



