courage enough to answer them. I would be glad to answer them myself 

 sometimes if I thought I had the ability and my answer would count. 



I came from Missouri to Illinois and was acquainted with the work over 

 there, and I find such a difference in the Missouri program compared with 

 the Illinois program! When 1 was an adviser in Missouri there was hardly 

 a week that passed but what some commercial fertilizer shark came around 

 to me and tried to interest me in his dope. I don't know whether they got 

 very far with the other farm advisors or not, but I know they did not with 

 me. 



We did not have the opportunity of putting over this program as we 

 have here in Illinois, because even our own agricultural college in Missouri 

 had never learned the lesson. I found it quite different when I came over 

 to Illinois in that I wasn't annoyed by these so-called fertilizer agents. 



This program of Dr. Hopkins as it is worked out, this simple formula 

 of maintaining soil fertility limestone, legumes and rock phosphate is so 

 simple that we are willing to go into it and study a little and put it into 

 practice, as Mr. Meis has done, and there is no excuse nowadays for not put- 

 ting these things into practice. We have a whole lot more information to- 

 day than we had fifteen or twenty years ago, and we are getting more every 

 day. 



Someone in the audience asks the question: "Is it necessary to have 

 your soil analyzed in order to apply these fertilizers intelligently?" That 

 has been done pretty nearly all over the state. I don't know how many 

 counties have had soil surveys made, but enough of them have so that if we 

 will get hold of a soil survey book, if it hasn't been made in our own county 

 and if we get it to the nearest one to our county we get a pretty good line 

 on our soil. You know, I think that is worth a world to us in Illinois, that 

 we have that information, and worked out in such detail that we know we 

 can go out and look a man's farm over and tell him, "Your farm is made 

 up of so many types, and this type of soil has so much phosphorus per acre, 

 this soil has so much limestone," as the man told you. He told you exactly 

 how many pounds of nitrogen in the first foot, how many pounds of phos- 

 phorus and how many pounds of each of those you ought to have in order 

 to have a good, fertile soil. Isn't that worth a world to us? Our forefathers 

 did not have that information. They did not need it. They did not need 

 it as we need it, because the soils were fertile and they did not have to worry 

 very much, but when our sons take hold of our farms, if we have not fol- 

 lowed the program as Mr. Meis has followed it, they have got an up-hill job. 

 With this vast information, the more we can know about it, the more faith 

 we can have in it, the more interesting it is. 



I can give you examples this morning of what Adams County farmers 

 have done in the way of applying rock phosphate and limestone and the re- 

 sults accomplished, just as Mr. Meis has done, but I will tell you folks, there 

 is a whole lot more about this that would be well if we knew. I believe thai 

 we ought to see the importance of teaching our young people these simple 

 problems of soil chemistry. I want to illustrate what I mean. 



SIMPLE CHEMICAL REACTION. 



We talk about liming the soil because the soil is acid. We want to know- 

 how to determine that. There are several ways worked out how to de 

 termine the acidity in the soil. The old familiar method, the litmus paper 

 method, we all understand the use of that and know what it means. We 

 know then that if it shows to be acid by applying limestone to correct the 

 acidity we grow more crops I wonder how much more we would be inter- 

 ested in this subject if we knew the chemistry of it. I wonder if I could 

 put it on the board. I use the illustration in my own county when I try 

 to put over the limestone program. I usually perform a little demonstration 

 I usually have with me a bottle of acid, a piece of limestone, a piece of flint, 

 or any other rock that is not limestone. If I take that limestone and pour 

 acid on it you will see it boil up, give off fumes. There is a reaction there. 

 Something happens. 



