8 THE AGRARIAN CRUSADE 



friend was better than to be forgotten. "I sug- 

 gest," he continued, "that Granges use black and 

 white Beans for ballots." 



In spite of all his difficulties, Kelley stubbornly 

 continued his endeavor and kept up the fiction of a 

 powerful central order at the capital by circulat- 

 ing photographs of the founders and letters which 

 spoke in glowing terms of the great national organi- 

 zation of the Patrons of Husbandry. "It must be 

 advertised as vigorously as if it were a patent medi- 

 cine, " he said; and to that end he wrote articles for 

 leading agricultural papers, persuaded them to pub- 

 lish the constitution of the Grange, and inserted 

 from time to time press notices which kept the or- 

 ganization before the public eye. In May, 1868, 

 came the first fruits of all this correspondence and 

 advertisement the establishment of a Grange at 

 Newton, Iowa. In September, the first permanent 

 Grange in Minnesota, the North Star Grange, was 

 established at St. Paul with the assistance of Colonel 

 D. A. Robertson. This gentleman and his associ- 

 ates interested themselves in spreading the order. 

 They revised the Grange circulars to appeal to the 

 farmer's pocketbook, emphasizing the fact that the 

 order offered a means of protection against corpora- 

 tions and opportunities for cooperative huving and 



