County Commissioners Reconsider Firing Home Demonstration Agent, Aug. 2, 1926

Action on Demonstration Work Is Deferred. . . County Commissioners Want More Co-operation from State—May Reach Decision Late This Afternoon. . . Women Besiege County Commissioners

Action on the matter of re-installing home demonstration work in Robeson was deferred by the county commissioners meeting in regular session here this morning, and the commissioners adjourned for dinner with the proposition under consideration, with little prospect of their reaching a final decision before late in the afternoon. Women appearing before them this morning gave them evidence enough of how much the work means to the county, and the only hold-up is occasioned by the fact that the county commissioners want more co-operation from the State.

Fifty women, representing every home demonstration club in the county, appeared before the commissioners with a deluge of talks, songs and yells. Mrs. Smith, a State club worker, made one of the feature talks, but short talks were also made by a representative from each of the clubs in the county. Club boys and girls, assisted by the women, made the walls of the Robeson county court house ring with their songs and yells.

Home demonstration work in this county was discontinued by the county commissioners at their last regular meeting, to be effective August 1. Since that time vigorous protests against this action of the commissioners has been registered by women throughout the county.

Editor’s Note: The increased cooperation the commissioners are asking the state for about money. The Cooperative Extension Service was established by the federal government (by an act of Congress). The federal government pays a portion, the state pays a portion, and each county that has an agent pays a portion of his or her salary. It was not unusual for counties to ask that the state government pick up a larger percentage of an agent’s salary, but I’m not aware of it ever being done. The reaction described above, the Home Demonstration Club women and the youth groups appearing before county commissioners, was a common and often effective way of keeping county agents.

From the front page of The Robesonian, Lumberton, N.C., Aug. 2, 1926

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