Sunday, February 19, 2012

County Agents Need Our Support and Understanding, 1945

By F.H. Jeter, Extension Editor, N.C. State College, Raleigh, as printed in the Wilmington Star, Feb. 28, 1945

When Dr. Seamon A. Knapp first envisioned the teaching of new agricultural practices by actual demonstrations in the field, the work of a “demonstration” agent was a comparatively simple thing.

If, for instance, the Experimental Station had discovered that a certain variety of a crop did better in that particular area, the agent could secure seeds of the crop and get some enterprising farmer to test them out in comparison with the leading local variety which had been planned in the community for years. Or, should it be that the most successful farmers in the section had found that a new method of fertilizing or cultivating had given larger crop yields than some of the older methods commonly followed, the agent could again demonstrate the use of these better methods. He could get out and prune one fruit tree in an orchard to show the others needed to be handled; or, he could cull one flock of hens in the presence of many flock owners that they might see how the job should be done to save feed and get more eggs.

He was a demonstration agent. He demonstrated the best practices as they were developed by the agricultural college, the Experiment Stations, and good practical farmers. But he soon found that he could make only so much progress with the old fellows. He then began to teach young boys how to grow an acre of corn, and many of them doubled the yields of their farmers. Then came other projects with pigs, chickens, beef cattle, dairy calves, tobacco, sweet potatoes, cotton and the like.

Organized 4-H Clubs were formed and while the boys learned how to do better farming, they also learned how to handle themselves in public meetings and to study the needs of the local community. They did much community work.

The Act of Congress setting up Extension work under the direction of the State College was passed in May 1914 and, since that time, the county agent system has proven its worth and has grown steadily all over the United States. There is at present in North Carolina a county agent in each of its 100 counties, a home agent in 9? {can’t read second number}, an assistant agent in many of the larger counties, a Negro farm and home agent in each of those counties with large Negro populations, and a special poultry or dairy agent in certain counties where these two lines of work are especially adaptable. These agents have back of them the combined information of the United States Department of Agriculture, the State College of Agriculture and its Experiment Station and Extension specialists. If the agent does not know exactly the answer to a given problem, he does know exactly where he can find the answers. No representative in any line of work has a better organization supporting him than the county agent.

But life for the agent has become more complex. At first, as I said, he was supposed to teach by demonstration and to train groups of persons at one time. He was never supposed to do any personal service for any one person or group of persons. Pruning one tree in an orchard to show how it should be done is one thing; but pruning all the trees in a man’s orchard is another thing altogether. Culling one poultry flock or enough of the flock to show how it is done is an agent’s job; but to go from farm to farm culling poultry is not his job.

It was hard at first for some of those in a county to learn this distinction. Back in the old days, before the veterinarians began to raise objections, the agent was almost required to vaccinate all of the hogs in a herd as a control against cholera. Petitions were signed by disgruntled hog owners if the agent failed to vaccinate their hogs.

Fortunately, that day passed and the agent could again do the job as outlined for him in the Smith-Lever Act. But not for long. There came the Agricultural Adjustment Act and it was found that no one could make the thing work but the county agent. He not only knew the farmers of his county better than anyone else but he knew a great deal about how the land had been used or cropped or, at least, he knew those men of the community better than anyone else but he knew a great deal about how the land had been used or handled. The agent was therefore required to begin the AAA and to make it work. He did and it did.

But he made enemies. The agent had to handle the job as government laws required, and sometimes the law is a “jackass” as some caustic commentator has said. The agent not only had to handle the AAA but with the Soil Conservation Service, the Farm Credit, the Farm Security, and the dozen other government agencies operating in a county, it became necessary that someone should coordinate these activities and help them to operate where they should work and be applied where they should be.

Gradually the agent began to be missing in his personal contacts with farmers on their farms. He saw them less and less. The matter became worse when farm labor and army deferments had to be handled. The agent was fast becoming an administrator of governmental laws and regulations, some of which to say the least were not always popular or understood by the farming public.

Where the agent has been a capable assistant and is himself an able administrator, patient and diplomatic, he has been able to meet these new demands. But he has come a long ways from the leisurely days when he was a field demonstrator. There is more activity and more news in the county agent’s office than in any other office in the county. He is dealing with those who produce our daily bread and who must produce it under increasingly heavy difficulties. He needs the careful support of his local county board of commissioners and of the good, upstanding and thoughtful farmers in every county. Altogether, they might work out the questionable problems to a successful conclusion. However, we should always keep this one thought in mind, the county agent is not at fault for everything that exasperates and injures the farmer. One the other hand, the county agent will always be on the farmer’s side and will do all that he humanly can to serve him best.

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