FARM BUREAU: RELATION TO COUNTY AGENT 225 



an attractive program, to get out a good crowd. The 

 meeting itself requires very careful attention to details 

 to make it go off well. County agents and officers will do 

 well to remember that this is their one opportunity of the 

 year to get all the members together in one rousing meeting 

 to promote the bureau's program and work. 



MEMBERSHIP CAMPAIGNS 



The collection of the membership fees, especially when 

 these have to be solicited annually, always gives officers and 

 committeemen much concern. Two general plans are in 

 use. The oldest and best, so long as it can be continued 

 successfully, is the collection of the fees by the voluntary 

 work of the community committeemen. The other, which 

 has been the method used in most of the Middle West and in 

 the South, since the advent of the American Farm Bureau 

 Federation, is the canvass by paid solicitors. In either 

 case the territory is divided up into districts, usually 

 school districts, and a committeeman assigned to each. 



On the voluntary basis the local committeemen, having 

 received previous instructions and equipment at the county 

 advisory committee meeting, call on all the farmers in their 

 respective districts, simultaneously, aided by a county-wide 

 publicity campaign. Where the committeeman is a good 

 one and knows how, he can and often does get one hundred 

 per cent of the farmers in his district as members. The 

 chief weakness in this plan is that so many local committee- 

 men do not know how or do not like to canvass for mem- 

 bers, so that they fail to function and as a result the mem- 

 bership is ' ' spotted. ' ' Another objection to this plan is that 

 the committeemen tire of the job, which is disagreeable to 

 many. This can be met in part by having the secretary 

 collect in advance as many of the old members' fees as he 



