RURAL AMERICA 



in cooperation with school officials and teachers in the rural 

 communities. These clubs are supervised by state agents or 

 assistants located at the agricultural colleges, and represent 

 both the colleges and the department. They are assisted by 

 county agents, who aid in the organization and maintenance 

 of the work, and by club specialists from the offices of the 

 Farmers' Cooperative Demonstration Work in the United 

 States Department of Agriculture. 



By far the most wide-spread and numerous organizations 

 of this character are the boys' corn clubs, but there are also 

 clubs for the growing of potatoes, grain, apples, as well as 

 for raising pigs and poultry. The prizes offered in practically 

 all of them have educational value, such as scholarships at 

 the agricultural colleges or short courses, trips to points of 

 interest, etc. 



The object of girls' demonstration work is to teach girls 

 gardening and the canning of vegetables and fruits for home 

 and market; to teach the family how to utilize the surplus 

 and waste products of the farm and garden; to stimulate 

 cooperation among members of the family and in the com- 

 munity; to provide a means for girls to earn money at 

 home; to pave the way for practical demonstrations in home 

 economics; to furnish teachers a plan for correlating home 

 work with school work. Out of the girls' canning club work, 

 which is extensive in the southern states, has grown the 

 employment of county women agents. They occupy the 

 same position to women and girls of the county that men 

 agents do to the men and boys of the county. 



F. Banks 



Within recent years much has been done for the farmer 

 in financial matters. Before the passage of the Bank Act 

 of December, 1913, there were four types of banking institu- 

 tions in the country: national banks, state banks, private 

 banks and building and loan associations. The first were an 

 outgrowth of the Civil War and were established to furnish 

 a market for government bonds and to provide a national 



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