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November y 1931 



THE I. A. A. RECORD 



Page Seventeen 



Newspaper Publishes 



Retraction of Statement 



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Propagandists Continue Spreading 

 Malicious Untruths About Coun- 

 try Life Insurance Co. 



SOME time ago there appeared an ar- 

 ticle in the Montgomery News, 

 Hillsboro, containing a number of er- 

 roneous statements about the Country 

 Life Insurance Company. The infor- 

 mation came to the editor apparently 

 from a disgruntled competitive life in- 

 surance agent who is finding Country 

 Life's low net cost insurance stiff com- 

 petition. 



The article asserted that a distribu- 

 tion of some $20,000 of dividends was 

 made to the officers of the company; 

 that the Country Life Insurance Co. 

 is a private enterprise and is not owned 

 and controlled by the Farm Bureau in 

 Illinois. 



When given a detailed statement of 

 the company's set-up in distribution of 

 dividends, the fair-minded editor of the 

 Montgomery News under date of Oc- 

 tober 8, 1931, published a retraction as 

 follows: 



"Concerning the Country Life 

 Insurance Company: . ' . ' . 



"On August 27th there appeared in 

 this paper an article concerning the 

 Country Life Insurance Company. At 

 that time the statements contained in 

 the article were believed to have come 

 from an authentic source. We have 

 since learned that the information was 

 erroneous and we are glad to make cor- 

 rection, as it has always been our policy 

 to co-operate with the farmers in their 

 efforts to help themselves. 



"Since printing the above mentioned 

 article we have procured information 

 founded upon facts that we are glad 

 to give to our readers: 



"The Illinois Agricultural Holding 

 Company was organized as a legal ne- 

 cessity to guarantee perpetual control 

 of the Country Life Insurance Com- 

 pany within the Farm Bureau move- 

 ment of the state. It has $50,000 of 

 authorized and issued First Preferred 

 Capital Stock, all of which is held by 

 Farm Bureau members and Farm Bu- 

 reaus in Illinois; $60,000 of Second 

 Preferred, which is all owned by the 

 Illinois Agricultural Association, whose 

 total membership is constituted by all 

 the County Farm Bureau members of 

 the state. The Illinois Agricultural 

 Association also holds all of the Com- 

 mon Stock, namely, 3,000 shares of no 

 par value and which carries the con- 

 trol of the company. None of this 

 common stock can be sold, except by 

 authorization of the Board of Delegates 

 of the Association assembled in an an- 



nual or special meeting called for that 

 purpose. 



"The total dividends paid by the 

 Country Life Insurance Company to 

 the Illinois Agricultural Holding Com- 

 pany, which owns all of the stock of 

 the Insurance Company, amojunts to 

 $20,000, payable: $5,000, February 14, 

 1930; $15,000, on November 14, 1930. 

 From this amount, a 7 per cent cash 

 dividend, or $3,500, was paid to the 

 First Preferred stockholders as of rec- 

 ord February 15, 1930, and $3,500, or 

 another 7 per cent dividend, was de- 

 clared to holders of record on December 

 1, 1930, completing the 7 per cent per 

 annum obligations to the stockholders; 

 14 per cent on the Second Preferred, 

 and 70 cents a share on the Common 

 Stock was declared and paid to holders 

 of record on December 1, 1930, also 

 completing its obligations on this out- 

 standing stotk. Practically all of the 

 income of the Holding Company has 

 been paid to the stockholders of the 

 Holding Company and its total operat- 

 ing expense for the year was $270.13, 

 the balance being in the treasury of the 

 Holding Company. ' ■- > 



"Before the close of the second year 

 of the Life Insurance Company the 

 Board of Directors declared a dividend 

 to be paid to policyholders upon the 

 payment of their third premium, which 

 was one year in advance of any obliga- 

 tion contained in the policy. 



"The manner in which the funds of 

 the Country Life Insurance Company 

 have been conserved is best described 

 in the 1931 Best Life Rating Chart, 

 which shows that the cost of adminis- 

 tration per $1,000 of insurance is 

 among the lowest, if not actually the 

 lowest of all the legal reserve life in- 

 surance companies covered by their re- 

 port. This report is supposed to cover 

 all legal reserve companies operating in 

 the United States." .^ 



In the meantime energetic enemy 

 propogandists have been giving wide 

 circulation to the original erroneous 

 statement while ignoring the retraction 

 presented above. Members are invited 

 to send in the names of such workers 

 found spreading libelous statements. 



CIRCUIT JUDGE ADVOCATES 



(Continued from Page 15) 

 In another recent address at Edwards- 

 ville, the judge advised farmers to or- 

 ganize as" an ultimate solution to their 

 problem. "If you farmers want to im- 

 prove your condition you must keep on 

 organizing," he said. "You can get 

 permanent relief in this machine age 

 only by organization and limitation of 

 production, and thus be put in a posi- 

 tion where you will have some voice in 

 setting the prices of your products." 



Accident Prevention 



Work Gets Results 



A decrease in the number of auto- 

 mobile accidents per hundred policies in 

 force in the Illinois Agricultural Mutual 

 Insurance Company during September, 

 1930 and 1931, in comparison with 

 September, 1928 and 1929, is shown by 

 a recent survey. J' y- ■' r- '■'■■• 



Manager A. E. Richardson gives the 

 accident prevention campaigns of the 

 I. A. A. and Farm Bureaus credit for 

 the drop in accidents. 



Accidents in September this year were 

 72 less than they would have been if 

 the accident rate of September, 1928, 

 had continued. They were 89 less than 

 they would have been on the basis of 

 the 1929 rate. 



"If we are to assume that each acci- 

 dent costs the company approximately 

 $40," said Richardson, "we find an 

 actual saving of approximately $2,880 

 on the basis of accidents in 1928 or 

 $3,5iJ^ on the 1929 accident rate. 



"We find that in 1928 we had 10,082 

 policies in force and that 2.142 per cent 

 of the policy-holders had accidents dur- 

 ing September. In 1929 we had 17,575 

 policies in force and 2.179 per cent of 

 them had accidents in the correspond- 

 ing period. :^ ■ :' /'Vv :;' /f 



"The first accident prevention cam- 

 paign was carried on in 1929, but it 

 was not well organized and did not 

 show very great results. In 1930 results 

 were more satisfactory. This year an 

 active campaign was again initiated and 

 at this writing is still in progress. In 

 September only 1.905 per cent of the 

 30,294 policy-holders had accidents." 



The campaigns were held in Septem- 

 ber because that is the peak month for 

 accidents. December is second high in 

 mishaps according to the company's 

 records. 



Waterfowl Show at Quincy 



The second water fowl exposition to 

 be held in Illinois will take place at 

 Quincy January 6-10 in connection 

 with the Illinois State Poultry Show, 

 according to the Illinois State Water- 

 fowl Breeders' Association. 



Competition in all classes of ducks 

 and geese is open to everyone, states 

 Ruth M. Adams of Alexander, secre- 

 tary of the organization. 



**I saved $96 on limestone, enough 

 to pay my dues for more than six 

 years, because of the services of the 

 Farm Bureau," writes Harvey Stan- 

 ley, member of the Clay County 

 Farm Bureau. 



