CHAPTER I 



THE FARM DEMONSTRATION WORK 



^^We then learned the philosophy and power 

 of agricultural demonstration'' 



THESE words were spoken by Dr. Seaman A. Knapp 

 on May 4th, 1906, in a memorable address before the 

 Ninth Conference for Education in the South at Lexington, 

 Kentucky. He was referring to an event that occurred just 

 twenty years previous to that date. In 1886 he had charge 

 of a movement to settle a vast tract of land in southwest 

 Louisiana. The descendants of the Acadians, described in 

 Longfellow's Evangeline, were thinly scattered over that 

 great domain and they made their living by looking after poor 

 grades of live stock. They were not good farmers. Extensive 

 advertising had been done in the Northwest and the settlers 

 began to arrive. Of course many of them did not know farm- 

 ing under these pioneer conditions, so they soon became dis- 

 couraged and demoralized. Dr. Knapp tells of a carload that 

 arrived in the evening, looked over conditions, talked with the 

 natives and left before breakfast. He said, ''In this emer- 

 gency we resorted to demonstration. ' ' He made an attractive 

 offer to one good western farmer for each township. He saw 

 that that man had proper instruction and guidance. In a few 

 years successful object lessons were established. The immi- 

 grant movement was a complete success from that time for- 

 ward and now there are more than 30,000 prosperous citizens 

 in southwest Louisiana whose coming is the result of this 



[I] 



