FIFTY MILLION STRONG 



in Rural America, there will come to be little trouble in holding 

 the people in their own communities. 



E. The County Fair 



The county fair, which is annually held in many counties 

 of the United States and seems to be growing more popular 

 in Rural America, is the one big play event of the year for 

 the open country. It is the one event in which all the people 

 take an interest. It assembles the best products of field and 

 garden; it interests the women and girls in choice specimens 

 of the art of cooking; it exhibits the finest farm animals; it 

 shows many samples of needle and similar work; it collects 

 the select wares of the merchant; it gives the results of the 

 county educational activities : school work, library work, 

 chautauquas, institutes, etc.; it calls attention to the efforts 

 put forth in the interest of a better religious life efforts put 

 forth in the churches, in the Sunday-schools, in the Young 

 Peoples' societies, in social service, etc.; it provides an abund- 

 ance of amusement. The county fair promotes sociability, 

 stimulates rural patriotism and leads to cooperation. From 

 one end of the country to the other the cry has gone forth 

 that the greatest need of the nation is a more wholesome 

 social life in Rural America. The county fair is doing its 

 part in supplying this need and it does it by showing the 

 people both the pleasures and the advantages of getting to- 

 gether. Furthermore, anyone who spends the better part of 

 a week in a study of the best things that his county produces 

 is pretty sure to have kindled on the altar of his heart the 

 fire of county patriotism. And where one finds a developing 

 social life and evidences of county patriotism, one is likely to 

 see the cooperative spirit begin to manifest itself. When the 

 county fair reflects the collective life of the county at its 

 best, it is doing a work whose value cannot be estimated. 1 



1 Lowering of standards through cheap attractions, permitted for mer- 

 cenary reasons, is a tendency to be deplored in some counties. 



