THE FARM DEMONSTRATION WORK 



more than 200 women agents engaged in their regular duties 

 before the Lever Extension Act was passed. 



While Dr. Knapp confined his activities mainly to the 

 Southern States he made numerous visits about this time to 

 other parts of the country. He addressed large audiences of 

 national educational and agricultural associations. The Uni- 

 versity of Wisconsin conferred a doctor's degree upon him 

 after he delivered an address to a large meeting of farmers 

 there. It was his opinion that the work was as much needed 

 in New York and New England as in the old South. A few 

 months before his death he made a trip to the scenes of his 

 childhood and early manhood in New York and Vermont, 

 and when he saw failing soils, deserted houses and indifferent 

 farming he longed to see his work inaugurated there. He 

 reasoned, too, that it should be done in the middle and western 

 states where the process of soil depletion was in operation, 

 but had not gone so far as it had in the older states. The 

 census figures showed that the average yields of corn in some 

 of these states were lower than they were forty, twenty and 

 ten years before. This would indicate that excellent demon- 

 stration work should be constantly done even in the wealthiest 

 and most intelligent communities in order to keep them 

 wealthy and intelligent. 



During 1914, the year when the Lever Bill became a law, 

 there were 781 Farm Demonstration Agents and 351 Home 

 Demonstration Agents. Members of Congress were familiar 

 with the work because they had seen the results of it in their 

 districts. Many of them became so interested that they secured 

 lists of the demonstrators and club members in order that they 

 might send them yearbooks and publications. They realized 

 that their farmers would profit by that kind of agricultural 

 literature, while they knew that thousands of such books and 



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