The County Agent, a 1940 Poem

From the Feb 1940 issue of The Southern Planter magazine

The County Agent

He is a useful critter,

   Who only used to toil;

To show us poor dumb farmers,

   How to till the soil.

His job was once quite easy,

   No more is this a fact.

Now it is quite complicated,

   By the Conservation Act.

Some of them are getting bald,

   Others are turning gray,

All of this “monkey business,”

   Without any extra pay.

Here’s to the County Agent

   His lot is sad to tell,

He’s a princely good fellow,

   But sure is catching -----.

--P.C. Turner

[P.C. Turner was president of the Maryland Farm Bureau Federation and himself a farmer. He debuted this poem at the annual meeting of his state’s county farm agents in Baltimore, Md.]