Top, left: Director Eaton 

 and son Harrison show ar- 

 rangement they have for 

 unloading hay In a hurry. 

 Top, right: Father and son 

 In front of their home tallc 

 over work to be done. Bot- 

 tom: They check over a 

 silage cutter and blower 

 they put together. 



DIRECTOR 

 J. King Eaton is Long Time 



TIME does not set J. King Eaton in 

 its plaster of Paris mould. He is a 

 type of Illinois farmer ever interested in 

 newer methods of operation and quite 

 willing to adopt them if practical. 



Perhaps it is his only son, 31 -year-old 

 Harrison, who keeps Dad on his toes. 

 Nevertheless, between them they have put 

 into practice a number of shortcuts and 

 better ways of performing farm tasks. 

 That sort of attitude would appear to be 

 most desirable among polic)- makers such 

 as the lAA board of directors to which 

 Eaton was elected in November, 1945. 



He succeeded Alvin O. Eckert of 

 Belleville, St. Clair county, and repre- 

 sents the 22nd congressional district 

 which includes the following counties: 

 Madison, St. Clair, Monroe, Washington 

 and Bond. 



The Eaton farm is in central Madison 

 county about two miles off U. S. highway 

 66 and is reached over a winding road 

 through a picturesque area of rolling 

 wooded hills. 



When we arrived at the farm, Mr. 

 Eaton and son Harrison were putting a 

 new roof on the barn. But Mr. Eaton 

 did not leave all the risky climbing to 

 Harrison. He scampered around on the 

 high barn roof with the agilit)- of a teen- 

 ager. 



The 265-acre Eaton farm is a three-way 

 partnership. Mr. Eaton owns 110 acres, 

 Mrs. Eaton 115 acres, and their son 

 Harrison 40 acres, all adjoining each 

 other. Mr. Eaton's holdings are part of 

 the original farm bought in 1857 by Di- 



By JIM THOMSON 



Ass't Editor, lAA RECORD 



rector Eaton's grandfather, a Kentuckian 

 who reached Illinois in 1856 by way of 

 Mississippi. The Eaton family came to 

 the American colonies in 1630 and lived 

 in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and New 

 York before migrating westward. 



Eaton was born on the farm where he 

 now lives and attended local schools and 

 spent part of a year at the Edwardsville 

 high school. At 21, after two years at 

 McKendrick college in Lebanon, he left 

 in 1907 to take over the home farm 

 which had been operated by his father, 

 a Civil War veteran. 



He was married in 1911 to the former 

 Anna Mae Hamilton, a neighboring farm 

 girl, and became a charter member of the 

 Madison County Farm Bureau in 1918, 

 helping to solicit membership for the 

 newborn organization. 



Because they operate a close-in farm 

 in the St. Louis milkshed the Eatons are 

 mostly concerned with dairy farming. 

 Much of their farm activity is centered 

 around a herd of 25 Jersey and Holstein 

 cows. 



Soil building is a mighty important 

 forerunner of high milk production, in 

 Director Eaton's opinion. That's why 



Editor's Note: This is the fifth of a 

 series of articles to acqiiaivt you tiitb the 

 men on the Illinois Agricultural Associa- 

 tion board of directors. 



his fields all have had liberal applications 

 of plant foods starting from as far back 

 as 1912 when Eaton first applied lime- 



Shaded area on map is 32nd congressional 

 district represented on the Illinois Agri- 

 cultural Association board of directors by 

 J. King Eaton of Edwardsville. 



12 



L A. A. RECORD 



