Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
created their own, more modest extension systems. Cornell University, for
instance, was very active in extension work, forming its own county-based
network of advisors as early as 1912, due in part to the support of Liberty
Hyde Bailey, dean of Cornell's College of Agriculture and an infl uential
member of the Country Life Commission. Many states throughout the
Midwest also adopted their own systems of extension work as it became
increasingly apparent that federal legislation would be passed to support
extension through the land-grant schools (R. V. Scott 1970, ch. 10).
Key to the extension model was the creation not only of a new system
of expertise through the farm advisors but also the organization of the
farmers themselves. One of the farm advisor's fi rst duties when he
9
arrived
in his county for work was to organize a local farm bureau, composed of
local growers who were interested in learning about new farming tech-
niques. These farm bureau centers were intended to extend and consolidate
the advisors' infl uence in their county, making it faster and easier to imple-
ment new practices. By meeting many growers in one gathering, advisors
could multiply their effectiveness. In addition, the farm bureau centers
were also supposed to be a place for rural people to meet with their neigh-
bors, to discuss important issues and to be entertained.
10
These same func-
tions could likely have been performed through other, already established
farm organizations, especially the Grange, which also had chapters in
counties throughout the United States. The Grange, however, was an out-
growth of the Populist movement of the late nineteenth century and had
been a key participant in that period's confl icts between farmers and fi nan-
cial interests. Thus, the Progressives in the Country Life movement and
other supporters of extension viewed the Grange with suspicion and dis-
trusted it as a vehicle for the new Cooperative Extension system. Despite
the protests of the Grange and other established farm groups, then, Coop-
erative Extension was created with the express intention of beginning a
new farm organization, one that did not come with preset political ambi-
tions and class interests.
11
Ironically, the farm bureau system did quickly become a forum for
growers' political lobbying efforts, although in a different way than other
farm organizations such as the Grange. Because the advisors themselves
often came from the rural middle class and were required to have a minimal
level of postsecondary education in some aspect of agricultural science,
Cooperative Extension initially attracted more fi nancially successful,
