294 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



The turnpike corporations have made Shelby county famous for its good h igb 

 ways, and recently valuable improvements have been added in the way of free 

 gravel roadsi. The construction of drainage has been unprecedented, the greater 

 portion of it having been done under the act creating Cijcnit Court (.'ommissioners 

 of Drainage. 



Excepting in a few instances in the city of Shelbyville, the disposition is to 

 accept such a fence law as will require stock to be fenced in, and not require a 

 larger investment by the people generally in fencing than in live stock. The 

 rapid disappearance of timber and the growing pride of the farmer and the city 

 home owner have been important factors in securing this impression. The only 

 opposition to the full acceptance of the doctrine comes from a few warm political 

 friends of the poor man's cow or hog. The County Commissioners have not, by 

 order, designated what stock shall be permitted to run at large; so we have a local 

 law requiring stock to be fenced in, but, having no penal clause, it has no enforce- 

 ment, except for occasional trespasses. 



The wheat crop of Shelby county can be safely estimated at ten per cent, in ad- 

 vance of the yield of 1883, while the corn crop is much better in quality and prob- 

 ably twenty-five per cent, better in quantity. 



I have had an opportunity recently to observe in abstract form the progress of 

 agriculture in this county since the 25th day of October, 1851, when "the citizens 

 friendly to agricultural improvement" met at the court house and selected Rev. 

 David Whitcomb to preside over the meeting, and David Thacher, then editing 

 and publishing the Volunteer, was chosen secretary. A society was formed, and 

 November 1, 185], the venerable Judge J. M. Sleeth, for a committee, reported a 

 cons^titution, and Thomas A. Hendricks, Martin M. Ray and James Elliott reported 

 by-laws. A librarian was one of the officers of the society, and it was made his 

 duty to subscribe for all such books and periodicals for the use of members as 

 might be ordered, and to keep a register of the receipt and the return of the same 

 by members. A committee was required to furnish two columns of agricultural 

 matter weekly to the Volunteer, and the librarian ordered to subscribe for The 

 Cultivator, $1; The Horticulturalist, $3; The Plow, 50 cents ; The Prairie Farmer, 

 $1 ; The Plow, the Loom and the Anvil, $2; Western Horticultural Review, $3 ;. 

 Ohio Agriculturalist, $1; Journal of Agriculture, $2; Pennsylvania Farm Jour- 

 nal, $1 ; American Farmer, $1 ; Indiana Farmer, $1 ; The Ohio Cultivator, $1. 



On the first Saturday in February, 1852, Governor Wright and W. T. Dennis 

 addressed the society. In the musty old volumes where this record is found is a 

 list of the premiums offered at the first fair of the pioneer society, and it covers 

 less than five and a half pages, written, in the book, eight by ten inches, and com- 

 prising farms, crops, horses, jacks and mules, cattle, hogs, sheep, fowls, fruits, 

 farming implements, flour and domestic manufactures. In the fii-st is a sensible 

 award, though abandoned by modern management : ''The best arranged and culti- 

 vated farm, a silver cup worth $10; for second best, Stephen's Farm Book, and a 

 diploma." The Farmers' Encyclopoedia, Coleman's European Agriculture, Ameri- 

 can Farm Book, silver cups, spoons and butter knives, etc., constituted the premi- 

 ums. In 1852 and 1853 these pages show that much annoyance was experienced 

 by " huckstering in the vicinity of the fair grounds." The progress of the society 



