ByLEWREISNER 



Fiald EdHer, lAA Record 



HOMER CURTISS, lAA director 

 from the 13th congressional dis- 

 trict is a modern and progressive 

 farmer and farm leader. You 

 can see it in his farming opera- 

 tions; you can tell it by his ef- 

 forts on behalf of Farm Bureau. 



This stocky, even-humored director is 

 as much a part of his community as the 

 rolling prairie and sparsely-wooded hill- 

 sides typical of the countryside around 

 his farm home near Stockton in Jo 

 Daviess county. But his interest and in- 

 fluence in farm affairs do not stop at the 

 county line. 



Curtiss came to the lAA board in 

 1942, succeeding Leo Knox of Morrison, 

 and represents Jo Daviess, Winnebago, 

 Carroll, Whiteside, Ogle and Lee coun- 

 ties. 



Not long after his election to the state 

 board, Curtiss was selected as a member 

 of the nation-wide dairy committee of 

 the American Farm Bureau Federation. 

 As an lAA director he has worked on the 

 board's marketing committee. 



Farming is Traditional 



"I guess I inherited an interest in 

 farm organization work," Curtiss said re- 

 cently. His grandfather, George W. 

 Curtiss, introduced the bill establishing 

 Farmers' Institute when he was a mem- 

 ber of the legislature at Springfield. The 

 Institute, although primarily educational, 

 was the farmers' forum of its day. 



Another ancestor, Major E. A. Giller 

 of Whitehall in Greene county, his ma- 

 ternal grandfather, was master of the 

 state Grange and, during his lifetime, 

 was active in the affairs of the national 

 Grange. 



The elder Curtiss, in a sense the 

 founder of the family farm, was an 

 eastern railroad man who came west to 

 live in northwestern Illinois. He 

 bought the 160 acres that is now the 

 Curtiss homestead for a total of $200 

 in 1851 and at one time owned about 

 1000 acres near Stockton. 



Homer is the fourth generation Curtiss 

 to own the home farm. He took over 

 management in 1927 after his brother, 

 George, left to manage the McLean 

 County Service Company, a position he 

 still holds. 



Editor's Note: This is the eighth of a 

 series of articles to acquaint you with, the 

 men you elected to the Illinois Agricul- 

 tural Association board of directors. 



Headline illustration at left shows one of 



lAA Director Curtiss' contoured fields. This 



field has been contoured since 1936. 



After graduating from the University 

 of Illinois College of Agriculture in 

 1927 Curtiss worked for a year in Mar- 

 shall-Putnam county as assistant farm ad- 

 viser. He returned to the home farm 

 in the spring of 1929 and with his bride, 

 the former Bernadine Shuman of Sulli- 

 van, a sister of lAA President Charles B. 

 Shuman, started farming on shares. 



Buys Homestead 



The young couple had just got a good 

 start farming before the depression came. 



"Although times were hard we seemed 

 to get along," Curtiss recalls, and during 

 1935 he contracted to buy the home farm. 

 In 1942 he bought an additional 120 

 and now farms 400 acres with the help 

 of a hired man and his three school age 

 sons. 



One of the first farmers in Jo Daviess 

 county to sign for soil conservation, Cur- 

 tiss has had more than 10 years' experi- 

 ence with contour and strip farming. He 

 contours only the steeper slopes. Much 

 of his land is level prairie. 



Curtiss is milking 34 cows this sum- 

 mer, somewhat more than the 25-30 cows 

 he normally keeps. His excellent herd of 

 purebred Holsteins seldom is far from 

 the top in the local dairy testing associ- 

 ation. 



In addition to his dairy herd, Curtiss 

 raises about 150 hogs a year and main- 

 tains a flock of chickens. He also raises 

 hybrid seed corn for one of the larger 

 commercial seed companies, about 60 

 acres a year, on a contract basis. 



He follows a four year corn, cosn, oats 

 and sweet clover rotation on the home 

 farm. On the rougher land he rotates 



in action with his hay field chopper, lAA Director Curtiss watches windrow as his 

 George, worics with pitchforic, and small nephew loolcs on. 



12 



L A. A. RECORD 



