ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 5 L 



while he is not a practical dairyman himself, knows a good deal 

 about dairying in the early days of Illinois, and we will listen 

 to what he has to say about those times. General Wilcox of 

 Elgin. 



ADDRESS. 



By General Wilcox, Elgin, Illinois. 



Mr. President and Friends : — 



I am very grateful indeed for the privilege you have given 

 me of attending once again an association of dairymen. 



I have heard many things tonight that remind me of other 

 days, and to be frank with you, I have also heard many things 

 indicating that the dairymen of this imperial commonwealth have 

 not progressed as they ought to have advanced in the number of 

 years that have been devoted to this great interest. 



1 remember the wey we milked the cows in pioneer days. 

 We sat on a one-legged stool. We did not have covered yards, 

 but milked out in the open, in the old rail pen, and once upon a 

 time, as I drove along the road, I passed a farm about milking 

 time and watched the milkman. He was sitting on a one-legged 

 stool. Presently he finished one cow, and rose to milk the next, 

 and the stool stuck out behind him like a third leg, a wooden one. 

 He had it strapped on. But we have drifted far from those 

 methods. 



Our pioneers, in Kane county, the birthplace of Illinois 

 dairying, found the virgin soil to be good, producing fine wheat 

 crops, and they made their homes there. Some prospered and 

 built better dwellings on the land, and here and there a substan- 

 tial farm barn in place of the straw stable. The quality in the 

 land that produced wheat soon began to fail, and presently that 

 pest of wheat, the chinch bug, appeared all over the land. With 

 the failure of the wheat crop, a change was imperative. 



Just then our magnificent city of the lakes began to assume 



