THE DEMONSTRATION WORK 



provided for the evolution of the man, which was the greater 

 thing. 



He realized, however, in later years that there were yet 

 many people at colleges, high schools and other institutions, 

 who did not fully understand the nature of the work, which 

 was still spreading so rapidly and getting such splendid results. 



In 1910 he wrote a letter to a student at Cornell Uni- 

 versity, who wanted to engage in a debate upon the effective- 

 ness of different methods of agricultural teaching. This letter 

 is t^^pical of many others that were written during that period : 



"What is needed for the masses in the United States is a reform 

 of farm methods. Now it is obvious to anyone who has observed, 

 that mere school teaching merely instructs; it rarely reforms. The 

 Colleges of Agriculture have been doing their work for over forty 

 years and Farmers' Institutes and agricultural papers have been 

 spreading knowledge in every direction, yet less than five per cent 

 of the farmers in some states of the South has accepted any material 

 improvement in their farm operations, and the great masses are as 

 wedded to their old systems as before these educational movements 

 were inaugurated. This is not an exception among farmers. Prob- 

 ably you will find that the inmates of any State's prison are just 

 about as orthodox in their beliefs or theory of theology as the 

 members of our best churches. They differ in their practices, and 

 this illustrates the defference between farm theories and farm prac- 

 tices. The object of the Demonstration Work is to bring the best 

 system of farm practices to the attention of the average farmer, in 

 such a way that he will accept it. This is done by inducing him to 

 set aside on his own farm an acre or more of land and manage it 

 according to instruction given by the United States Department of 

 Agriculture. What a man sees or hears he may doubt but what he 

 does he cannot doubt and, therefore, if a man finds he can double his 

 crop at a reduced cost for cultivation he becomes a convert to the 

 principles of crop management as taught by the Demonstration 

 Work. These sample farms are placed in every neighborhood, then 

 monthly the neighbors are called to observe, investigate and discuss 



[22] 



