60 RURAL RECONSTRUCTION 



with the county agent and under him rank as a second great 

 means of profitable advance. 



So illuminating a light could not be long kept concealed under a 

 bushel. Members of Congress inquired into the work done, and, in 

 order that it might be extended to the more spacious north and 

 west, proposed the appropriation of public funds to its endowment. 

 About 1906 the county authorities, discovering in the work accom- 

 plished evident seeds of good, began to contribute to the funds, 

 which had previously been raised exclusively by voluntary action. 

 The work began with demonstration plots laid out by the agents 

 to which farmers were invited on certain occasions. Unlike our 

 farmers in Sussex, as already related, the agent had the satisfac- 

 tion of seeing them come in large numbers. He went over the 

 ground with these visitors, explained what the demonstrations were 

 intended to show and discussed the results in a familiar colloquial 

 fashion. Farmers were soon brought to see the value of improved 

 methods and gradually adopted them. The results of hundreds of 

 these demonstrations in the county gave the farmers confidence in 

 the ability of the agent, and thus grew up a great variety of work 

 on the part of the county agent in imparting general instruction 

 and advice to farmers when he was unable to visit their farms 

 regularly. 



Up to 1912 practically all the extension work of this character 

 remained limited to the fifteen States of the south. After that it 

 was begun to be taken up further north. 



In 1914 the " Smith-Lever Act," also known as the " Agricul- 

 tural Extension Act," was passed, making substantial funds avail- 

 able for extension work, under condition of a certain programme of 

 action being pursued. That Act has led American Administration 

 of Agriculture on an entirely new tack, not only promising, but 

 already yielding, rich fruit in the shape of results, representing a 

 wholly new and profitable policy. There had been Acts before to 

 recognise the national importance of agriculture and make national 

 funds available for its promotion, such as the Morrill Act of 1862, 

 the Hatch Act of 1887, and the Adams Act of 1906. However, the 

 Smith-Lever Act, emphasising the necessity of " extension," and 

 providing means for such, struck out an entirely new path. It 

 allotted 480,000 dollars, with another much larger sum to follow, 

 to be applied according to the population of each State for purposes 

 of " extension," mainly through the action of county agents. 



The county agents were to carry this institution all over their 

 particular county into the very homes of farmers — in addition to 



