14 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



cussions and give their views upon different subjects, will 

 disseminate through your valuable reports and the press, 

 that knowledge of agricultural subjects which is not only 

 theoretical but practical, I predict for you an earnest, in- 

 telligent and appreciative audience, and assure you that a 

 cordial welcome is in the hearts of the people of Franklin 

 County. 



The county of Franklin, while one of the smallest in area 

 in the State, does her full share in its agricultural produc- 

 tions. Seventeen years ago to-morrow you opened with im- 

 posing ceremonies your seventeenth annual winter meeting 

 in this building. That meeting of the Board was productive 

 of immense value to the agriculture of the State, and partic- 

 ularly to the Connecticut valley. It was considered by all 

 to have been the most interestins: meetinff held to that date, 

 and many still regard it as the commencement of a new era 

 in the agriculture of Massachusetts. The butter exhibit in 

 connection with that meeting gave a new imjDetus to the 

 dairying branch of farming. Hon. James S. Grinnell, who 

 was then president of the Franklin County Agricultural 

 Society, chairman of the committee of arrangements and 

 the moving spirit which guided the meeting to a most suc- 

 cessful termination, welcomed your honorable Board to the 

 hearts and homes of the people of Greenfield. In that 

 address he gave to the public a very complete and exhaustive 

 statement of the agricultural productions of the county up 

 to and including the census of 1875. 



I have thought that it would be of interest to you to know 

 at this time whether the farmers of Franklin Countj^ have 

 been true to their calling and public benefactors, in that 

 they have made ' ' two blades of grass grow where but one 

 grew before " during the interim from 1875 until the present. 

 I have been unable to procure the statistics from the State 

 census of 1895, and am obliged to rely upon the national 

 census of 1890 ; and I believe that the increase and decrease 

 in the several productions will retain the same ratio during 

 the five years not accounted for. 



In 1875, according to the State census, the population of 

 the count}' of Franklin was 33,696. The State census of 

 1885 showed an increase to the number of 37,449, while the 



