33-i RURAL MICHIGAN 



cattle arranged in classes. At 2 o'clock P. M, an 

 able address was delivered by Hon, Francis W. Shear- 

 man of Marshall. Then followed a trial of trotting 

 horses and female equestrianism. . . . The pre- 

 miums awarded amounted to over $500 which were 

 all paid in cash." The society owned seven acres 

 of ground within the city limits of j^iles "enclosed 

 with a substantial fence," and "handsomely fitted 

 up." In the same year there were 870 entries at the 

 Hillsdale County fair, 952 at the St. Clair County 

 agricultural fair, and the Washtenaw County fair 

 numbered l,fi52 entries in that year. Among the 

 exhibits at this fair in 1859 was a pair of oxen weigh- 

 ing 4,000 pounds and a cow "said to give sixty-five 

 pounds of milk a day."' The Ann Arbor Local News 

 of October 18 notes that "the general interest in 

 wool-growing was manifest in the large and choice 

 assortment of sheep exhibition." The sheep were 

 chiefly of the Spanish Merino, Silesian and South- 

 down breeds, the paper reports. Then there was a 

 floral and a fine art display, in the latter depart- 

 ment appearing "E. H. Crane's revolving, self-setting 

 game and rat-trap." The paper observes that rat- 

 catching is surely a "fine art," as pursued by this 

 device which when set would "catch a rat, kill him, 

 throw him away in a box and set itself for another, 

 and so continue to do until it has caught fourteen." 

 In the implement exhibit at this fair, there caught 

 the attention of the assembled farmers "Rirdsall and 

 Brokaw's combined Clover-thresher, Huller and 

 Cleaner," which "threshes, hulls and cleans from 



