HAMPSHIRE COUNTY FARMERS' MONTHLY 



CLUB WORK 



THE ANNUAL MEETING 



Has anything been accomplished dur- 

 ing the past year? Well, 957 projects 

 were taken by boys and girls. Some 

 members took more than one project but 

 there were at least 900 different boys and 

 girls starting Club Work. Of the 957 

 there were 486 boys and 471 girls. Some 

 of these members fell by the wayside. 

 They didn't have enough backbone to 

 stick-to-it but 695 did finish. 306 boys 

 and 389 girls did the required work and 

 got their clover leaf pins. This means 

 that 72.67f did what they agreed to do. 

 Who helped? Fifty-five leaders scatter- 

 ed throughout the county acted as rud- 

 ders and so steered the club ship through 

 the year. Superintendents of Schools 

 favored the work and many times were 

 active in encouraging it. The Granges 

 have helped. Many community people 

 have said a good word at the light time 

 for it and we surely don't forget the 

 mothers and fathers who do more than we 

 generally give them credit for. Without 

 their interest Club Work wouldn't pro- 

 gress very far. These 69 clubs have been 

 under the direction of 55 leaders who 

 have held meetings and worked together 

 throughout the club year. 



Last spring about 15 exhibits were 

 held in the diff"event communities at which 

 over 2000 attended to see the work of the 

 boys and girls. During the year the 

 dairy members have been to Mt. Hermon 

 and the Mixter Farms. A group of 25 

 poultry members went to Brattleboro on 

 an inspection trip to the Wirthmore Grain 

 Mixing Mills. Members from this county 

 judged at Greenfield, Worcester, Spring- 

 field, Northampton, Cummington, New 

 York City, Boston, Amherst and Brock- 

 ton. 



Big Winnings 



1. The county poultry team won the 

 state championship at the Boston Poultry 

 Show. 



2. The county poultry team won 2nd 

 place at the New York Show at Madison 

 Square Garden. 



3. The first place for 70 entered in 

 the judging contest at the Eastern States 

 Exposition went to a Hampshire County 

 boy, Herman Andrews of Southampton. 



4. At Brockton the Hampshire County 

 Team won first place and therefore the 

 county championship in judging dairy 

 cattle. 



5. At Brockton the $100.00 scholar- 

 ship prize tried for by 134 boys from 

 Massachusetts was won by Roger West 

 of Hadley. 



At Northampton Fair the 1000 or more 

 exhibits expressed club work better than 

 ever before. 



Supe'intendent O. A. Morton Speaks 



Mr. Morton, superintendent of Hadley 

 and Hatfield schools talked on "The 

 Benefits of Club Work." An important 

 part of Mr. Morton's talk dealt with the 

 strength which club work adds to the 

 good wholesome parts of the old New 

 England home where father and son, 

 mother and daughter, worked together. It 

 is easy these days to work away fiom the 

 home on account of the many attractions 

 and consequently many of those homely, 

 important tasks done by the boys in 

 years when hasty pudding was welcomed 

 for supper are being avoided, missed and 

 ignored by the present day boys and girls. 

 Not because the boys and girls are ob- 

 stinate, different or that the parents don't 

 wish them to become home builders but 

 [ more on account of the greater variety 

 j of pleasure and activity at hand. For 

 j this reason, a doing of home tasks, im- 

 ' provements, an interest in agriculture, 

 Mr. Morton scored club work as a most 

 valuable asset to country life. He sees 

 value in the project idea — that each boy 

 or girl should have a piece of work which 

 I they manage and emphasized the fact 

 I that any profit should go to the boy or 

 I girl. 



! Mr. Ashley Randall Tells of the 



Community 

 Mr. Ashley Randall of Granby gave an 

 idea of "Club Work in the Community" 

 and stated that three clubs had been car- 

 ried on in the past year in Granby. Many 

 useful garments had been made by the 

 1 girls under the direction of the school 

 - teachers and in handicraft work the boys 

 had made good use of tools. The interest 

 in these clubs was sufficient for them to 

 give an entertainment at which they 

 made money to buy equipment. He also 

 mentioned the poultry club which he leads 

 and states that besides having interested 

 boys and meetings they have flocks of 

 birds as good and better than their Dads ! 



Bronislaw Lebi^cki, Poultry Champion, 

 Speaks 



Bronislaw's subject was "What I Have 

 Done in Club Work" and in starting his 

 talk he said the subject might better be 

 "What Club Work Has done for me." 

 Bronislaw's club life has been encouraged 

 by Smith Agricultural School along with 

 the Extension Service and partly through 

 the encouragement of these two agencies 

 and perhaps more through the persis- 

 tance and interest of Bronislaw himself 

 he has not only increased his flock from a 

 small, mongrel lot of birds to a flock of 

 ninety high producing purebred White 

 Wyandottes but has also become County 

 Champion in poultry, represented Mass- 

 achusetts at Camp Vail and was a mem- 

 ber of the winning judging team at 

 Brockton this fall. And still he says he 

 is going to keep at it. 



IN A COMMUNITY 



An Extension Agent's road is not all 

 strewn with flowers. Without doubt 

 thorns do us good. But we form quick 

 ideas of men who condemn Club Work. 

 While in one community recently trying 

 to get help and backing from a communi- 

 ty man who happened to be Chairman of 

 the School Board, therefore one probably 

 interested in young people, he brought out 

 this as his first argument. 



"I'm not very strong for this Club 

 Work all this sewing. I think they did 

 too much of it last year." 



I said, "Well, it will be hard for them 

 to learn too much about work which 

 makes better homes, won't it? The arti- 

 cles they made were useful and practical 

 and they were learning something they 

 ought to know later." 



He switched a bit then and said, "Yes, 

 that's so, I guess, but I think the mother 

 is the best teacher." 



I agreed with him that the mother's 

 interest and help might be unsurpassed 

 but that even so "The working together 

 on similar work, and having the interest 

 continually propped up by each other and 

 a local leader, strengthens the desire to 

 learn even what the mother holds out." 



He said he couldn't consent to let the 

 boys use the play basement a large room 

 35 X 15, to do a little handicraft work un- 

 der the direction of a man leader we se- 

 cured for the boys out of tovm. This 

 pai'ticular basement happens to have a 

 concrete floor and walls and his argument 

 against its use was because of the harm 

 they would do. 



To give an example of using the base- 

 ment of a school for such work I will cite 

 the case in Granby where we have had no 

 complaint about the boys misusing the 

 place. A bench was built in the Granby 

 basement and soon after that the towTi 

 repaired the floor to make the room better 

 for the boys. In that room and on that 

 bench the boys made a shirt waist box, a 

 carpenter's horse, a coat rack, an iion- 

 ing board, radio set and other similar 

 articles. We have no reason to feel that 

 the community folks don't appreciate the 

 encouragement gotten by the boys in 

 Club Work after a number of years trial. 



We wonder if the chairman of the 

 School Board in the first community 

 mentioned doesn't feel that Club Work is 

 carried on to please the Extension Ser- 

 vice rather than to supply something 

 which the boys and girls of his community 

 wouldn't otherwise get. 



Miss Mildred Daley and Miss Mildred 

 Brown both teaching at Haydcnville have 

 organized clubs with their girls. There 

 are twenty girls starting the clothing 

 work for the first time. 



