4-H: An American Idea 1900-1980 and The 4-H Story

The following story is from the National Compendium of 4-H Promotion and Visibility on the National 4-H History website — http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History/4-H_Promotion/


There have been two major authoritative history books published at the national level on 4-H during the first 100 years of its existence.

4-H: an American Idea 1900-1980, A History of 4-H,” was written by Thomas Wessel and Marilyn Wessel, and published by National 4-H Council in 1982, in cooperation with the Cooperative Extension Service. It documents the record of excellence of the nation’s largest youth educational organization, recounting 80 years of change, evolving from a program primarily concerned with improving agricultural production and food preservation to one dedicated to the development of young people. It follows the expansion of 4-H from an almost exclusively rural organization to one serving young people wherever they live – in the city, small town, suburb or on the farm.

Prior to the Wessel book, the major history on 4-H was “The 4-H Story, A History of 4-H Club Work” written by Franklin M. Reck and published by the National 4-H Service Committee in 1951.

The Wessel book does not replace the Reck book, but reinforces it and brings the history 30 years closer to the present.

Frank Reck, author of "The 4-H Story" stays busy autographing his history book for delegates at the 1951 National 4-H Congress. (From January 1952 National 4-H News)

Frank Reck, author of “The 4-H Story” stays busy autographing his history book for delegates at the 1951 National 4-H Congress. (From January 1952 National 4-H News)

Together, they make good resources on 4-H, although neither had the luxury of space to tell the “whole story” on the many faceted areas of 4-H history. Both histories are digitized and appear in the books archives of the 4-H History website.

4-H History Preservation Newsletter
July 2015

County_Agent

Norman Rockwell painted the “The County Agent” for the cover of Saturday Evening Post. The people pictured were an actual county agent, 4-H family and their hired man.

Unusual summer rains didn’t dampen the 4th of July crowd’s spirit on DC’s National Mall!


Declaration of Independence… July 4 or August 2?

As we all know, the US Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. However, even though independence had been declared, delegates to the Continental Congress had not yet signed the document. It wasn’t until August 2, 1776, that the Declaration of Independence became official.


National 4-H Supply Service

 How old is the National 4-H Supply Service? Who was its very first customer and which 4-H products were the first items to be sold? You can find out inside.



The County Agent

 The iconic Normal Rockwell painting, “The County Agent”, illustrating 4-H projects of an Indiana farm family, was first published as a Saturday Evening Post cover. Can you guess the publication date?


Hands-on . . .

 “Hands-on History” this month features photography, a great way to visualize the important and fun parts of your 4-H history.



IFYE (International Farm Youth Exchange)

Though 4–H entered the international arena as early as 1935, it wasn’t until years later that the first exchange of farm youth took place. IFYE (International Farm Youth Exchange) was born in 1948.


Map Your 4-H History

“2015 FilmFest 4-H” and “Map your 4-H History” highlight two examples of “Contemporary 4-H History,” current nation-wide programs that are now making 4-H History.


The July 4th fireworks are over in this marvelously independent country and the 4-H summer season is underway. Amid the hard work and deserved fun, enjoy this issue!


4-H History Preservation Newsletter
June 2015

Summer officially starts in just a few days, typically the busiest season for 4-H.
The run-up to summer is just as busy, as you’ll see in this issue.

4-H Travel

Travel has long been a key part of the 4-H learning portfolio at county, state, national and international levels.  The 1959 Iowa to Kentucky 4-H exchange is what led to creation of the national Citizenship Short Course.  This month’s “Hand-on 4-H History” activity brings travel to the club level.

4-H Pledge and Motto

You certainly know the 4-H Pledge and Motto.  But do you know what year they were both officially adopted?  Hint: it was at a National 4-H Camp.

Kidnapped by 4-H’ers

Indiana Travelers Kidnapped by 4-H’ers!” is an unlikely headline.  But read (and chuckle) about how Georgia 4–H members learned hospitality and treated tourists to a fun-filled weekend in 1953.

31CampBlackWhite_600The entire National 4-H Camp delegation visited President and Mrs. Hoover at the White House on June 23, 1931.

Map Your 4-H History

Do you know where your county’s first 4-H club started?  Is that site on the online National 4-H History Map?  Find out how to make sure that part of your history is recorded electronically for posterity.

FilmFest 4-H

Teen film-makers gather again this year for 2015 FilmFest 4-H in St. Louis.  Professionals from the film industry help young people hone their cinematic skills in this fifth annual celebration of youth-made films – without the popcorn.  4-H History is a category for the competition.

We know you’re also busy with summer work (garden?) and plans (vacation?) but take a few minutes off and enjoy this issue!

4-H History Preservation Newsletter
May 2015

It feels like the summer season of 4-H has already started and it’s only May!

FilmFest 4-H 2015

The fifth annual national 4-H film festival – FilmFest 4-H – will be held next month in St. Louis. Read some of the topics to be covered by film media professionals as they work with teen film-makers from across the country.

4-H on the Radio

May 1922 saw the beginning of 4-H radio promotion initiated by the National Committee on Boys’ and Girls’ Club Work. From then on, the role of radio in 4-H evolved and expanded in step with changes in the program’s focus and in audience needs and interests.

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4-H’ers telling the 4-H Story through media 1940s National 4-H Camp Radio Broadcast

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Todays 4-H Videographers

1984 Honorary Chairman

Who was the Honorary Chairman of the Board of National 4-H Council in 1984, and where did that group meet in May of that year? It marks a decades-long tradition about which there’s discussion to renew.

4-H Storefront

The 90-year-old 4-H Supply Service – 4-HMall.com – unveils a new venture into e-commerce. Do you know a member, alum or leader who deserves a 4-H Gift Card? Here’s the place to get it.

Map Your 4-H History

What if your 4-H Camp was once used as a POW camp in a world war; shouldn’t that important bit of 4-H history be recorded? Having gone live on April 28, the internet-based atlas of 4-H seeks nominations of historically-significant people, places and events to be documented on this interactive site. Get your county or state 4-H history on the map!

History of the 1890 Land Grant Universities

1890 Land Grant Universities have a rich history in 4H youth development. With 2015 being the 125th year of the Morell Act which created the 1890 schools, those institutions are collecting their unique chapters of the National 4-H History story. Here’s how you can help.

If it’s as hot where you are as it is here, pour an icy glass of lemonade, find a hammock and enjoy this issue.

National 4-H Council’s Legacy Awards – Honoring 4-H Youth

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On Thursday, April 23, 2015, National 4-H Council hosted our 6th Annual Legacy Awards. On this special evening we were joined by dignitaries, community leaders, philanthropists, advocates and entertainers to celebrate the 4-H mission and most importantly our youth and their impact on this world.  This year’s event was emceed by Mara Schiavocampo of ABC News – read her bio.

Together, we honored the accomplishments of our youth and those individuals that make it possible for millions of young people to learn important life and leadership skills through 4-H youth development programs.  Our 2015 honorees were Nosa Akol, Youth in Action Award winner, and Javier Palomarez, Distinguished Alumni Medallion winner.

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Proceeds from this event enable National 4-H Council to continue its vital work on behalf of our young people everywhere.

It was a night to remember. Thank you for celebrating the mission and great work of 4-H’ers across the world by supporting the 2015 Legacy Awards.

Follow #4HLegacy

History Preservation Newsletter
April 2015

Washington DC’s Cherry Blossoms are in bloom for National 4-H Conference!

It’s going on this week at the National 4-H Youth Conference Center. This is the 85th gathering of 4-H’ers in DC since National 4-H Camp started in 1927. 4-H members from across the country are meeting with their congressional delegations, testifying on Capitol Hill, and visiting the White House – all long-held National 4-H Conference traditions. (The National 4-H Calendar painting, at the right, documents a time in the early 1970s when 4-H Conference also coincided with the Cherry blossoms in full bloom.)

Map Your 4-H History

April 28 signals the debut of the “Map Your 4-H History” project wherein individuals, clubs, counties and states can nominate a historically important person, place or event on the National 4-H History Map. This geospatial project of the 4-H History Map Team is explained at

http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History_Map/

The explanation and the map go live starting April 28.

Wood County

Wood County, Ohio, has an active 4-H display program at the county Historical Museum. It’s a great example of what you can do to showcase your county’s 4-H history. The brief interview explains how it came to be – and possibilities of how you can make it happen in your area.

4-H in the Great Depression

New to the 4-H History website: “4-H in the Great Depression.” An important and meaningful story of how 4-H helped maintain threatened family farms in that troubled era. Read a capsule here and the entire story on the website.

FilmFest 2015

FilmFest 4-H is June 14-17 in St. Louis. The 4-H History Team supports this youth film-making project for the third consecutive year; the 4–H History category highlights films documenting 4-H memories of former members, staff and volunteers.

We don’t have a “Letters to the Editor” column (yet), but we welcome your comments, ideas and suggestions – even mild complaints – at Info@4-HHistoryPreservation.com


Enjoy spring, and enjoy this issue … http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/Newsletter/


History of National 4-H Youth Conference Center Added to Website

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History of National 4-H Youth Conference Center Added to Website

The first Draft of the History of the National 4-H Center was recently added to the 4-H History Preservation Website. Please take a look at
http://4-HHistory.com/?h=4-H_Center

There are many pieces of this history missing as much of it has been lost in the many construction projects and changes at the Center. The History Team would welcome any additions to complete this History by those who have worked or attended programs here over the past 55 years. Contact info@4-HHistoryPreservation.com

Many people in our reading audience have visited and/or worked at the National 4-H Center (now the National 4-H Youth Conference Center); to all of them it is definitely more than a group of buildings. We asked one of those visitors/workers to tell us what it meant to him.

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1979 4-H Program Assistants at Citizenship Washington Focus make a human pyramid as part of their team building exercise.

The Center of it All

By Ron Drum, National 4-H Council and National 4-H History Preservation Team Member

It’s just 12.5 acres on Connecticut Avenue in Chevy Chase, Maryland, one mile north of the District of Columbia line and only seven miles north of the White House. It was originally built as an Inn in 1893, turned into a girls’ finishing school and, in the early 1950s when 4-H was looking for a national home, it became the location of that home. Purchased with money borrowed from a life insurance policy and paid off with the help of the nickels and dimes sent by 4-H’ers from across the country, those 12.5 acres became the national home of 4-H, the National 4-H Center.

Opened in 1959 by President Eisenhower, almost everyone who visits the place senses how special and important it is. I felt it the first time I visited. It’s now an oft-told-tale how, as a Citizenship Short Course delegate in 1973, I sat on the front steps of old Smith Hall and thought “I’m going to work here someday.” Even I could not have guessed that I’d actually return three times to do so.

I first returned in 1979 to serve as one of the first Citizenship Washington Focus (CWF) Program Assistants, the year Citizenship Short Course became CWF. By then things had changed. National 4-H Council had been created in 1976 by joining the National 4-H Service Committee with the National 4-H Foundation. Smith Hall had become J. C. Penney Hall, rebuilt with a sizeable gift from J. C. Penney. A new dormitory and conference room complex (Firestone, McCormick, and Kellogg Halls) now comprised the recreated campus; Turner and Warren Halls still stood to the left and right of J.C. Penney Hall as if guards.

The Supply Service stayed in Turner Hall. The Program Assistants (PAs) stayed in Warren Hall, named for Gertrude Warren, the first head of Girls Club Work at USDA. Twenty-eight early 20- somethings found ourselves living together for three months in that small building – I wonder what the fire marshal thought! I roomed with Thomas Tell Tyler Thompson from Tennessee in a basement bedroom. A little stream would flow through it whenever it rained – until they fixed the foundation.

Tyler, as he liked to be called, would open CWF each week by announcing, a la Harold Hill of The Music Man, “Now either you are closing your eyes to something you don’t wish to acknowledge or you are simply not aware of the caliber of opportunities awaiting you here at the National 4-H Center!”

In January 1980 I left Council to try my hand at 4-B in Botswana but returned again in 1981, welcomed back by Ray Crabbs and Francis Pressly; assigned to the staff of Jean Cogburn and John Allen. Although against policy, I began dating a co-worker named Phyllis Dupuis. We got around policy in 1983 by getting married; one of many such “connections made at the National 4-H Center (perhaps another story?).” It was during this time that Louise Kilpatrick told me, “If you want to be successful in Extension, you need to leave Council and work in a county. That is where the real work of 4-H occurs.” So, in 1984, I left Council to see if Louise was right.

As a 4-H Agent in Massachusetts, then a member of Maine’s 4-H staff, I had many happy occasions to return to the National 4-H Center with delegations to CWF, National 4-H Conference and other programs. However, it wasn’t until 2002 that I was able to return again as an employee – this time to coordinate the development and implementation of 4-H Afterschool under the direction of Dr. Eddie Locklear. Eddie retired and 4-H Afterschool became an essential vehicle for 4-H; my work continued with 4-H Science and grant management.

But when the day arrives that I leave for the third time, perhaps I’ll think of how Patti, one of the ‘79 PAs, expressed her feelings as she prepared to return home at the end of that summer, “It’s not like going home, it’s like leaving home. You’ve become family.” Leaving Council can be something like that. I know I’ll hear the words of Dot Emerson. As the ’79 PAs departed she said, “What I have learned from you would be like living in a foreign country. New ideas, new freedoms, nonsense, laughter, and enlightenment.” That is what being at the National 4-H Center is like.

The National 4-H Center. It’s just a few buildings located on 12.5 acres in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Yet it is so much more.

History Preservation Newsletter
March 2015

March is supposed to come in like a lion, right? Well in DC, it’s been doing that!

Thanks to you and others, your 4-H History website hit the 100,000th US visitor! We’re delighted and you should be too! If you’ve not visited, you’d better get in there before the next 200,000th visitor is announced.

Coming Soon

We’ll be adding an interactive National 4-H History Map! Participate by sharing your most important local historical 4-H sites. Join in next month!

New Feature

The all-new History website feature highlights decades of 4-H promotions and the compendium brings them all to life for you.

Partner with Us

We’d welcome a state to partner with the 4-H History Preservation Team to devise and deliver a 4-H history component for a newly-proposed staff development training module. Interested?

Donor Tracking

4-H has benefited from years of private (and public) sector support. We’re tracking the enormous impact of donor support to 4-H youth development; it’s much more than you think.

Get to Know the Center

What is that place we call the “4-H Center?” For those who visit and work there, it’s way more than most of us could ever imagine.

4-H FilmFest 2015

4-H FilmFest 2015 kicks off in St. Louis in June. Will your 4-H’ers submit a video or film in the “Voices of 4-H History” category? Hope so.

Support the 4-H History Preservation Team

Please take a moment to click on the “DONATE” button at the top of the page or below. It will take you to a list of items where funds are needed to keep this totally volunteer History Team working to preserve the valuable indeed irreplaceable history of 4-H. Every gift is tax deductible.


If you’re reading this in front of a fireplace, enjoy and don’t tell us; if you’re basking in sunshine, don’t tell us that either. We’re hoping that promised March lamb is coming to DC shortly!

We hope you enjoy this issue.

Delegate discussion group at National 4-H Conference, National 4-H Center, 2006

Delegate discussion group at National 4-H Conference, National 4-H Center, 2006

District of Columbia 4H’ers at National 4-H Youth Science Day, National 4-H Center, 2013

District of Columbia 4H’ers at National 4-H Youth Science Day, National 4-H Center, 2013

Time to ‘Spring Ahead’

TimeAndDate.comYep.  It’s that time again.  When anyone living somewhere that uses daylight saving time to adjust how life is lived.

Here in the United States, Daylight Saving Time, or DST, begins at 2:00AM on Sunday, March 8, 2015.

Daylight Saving Time (DST) is used to save energy and make better use of daylight. The idea has been suggested in ancient times and later by famous scientists.

DST is a change in the standard time with the purpose of making better use of daylight and conserving energy.

Clocks are set ahead one hour when DST starts. This means that the sunrise and sunset will be one hour later, on the clock, than the day before.

For more information on the history of Daylight Saving Time, please visit http://www.timeanddate.com

One more thing…

Daylight Saving Time ends in the United States at 2:00 AM on Sunday, November 1, 2015.

Yowza!

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100,000 !

At roughly 10:00 on Friday, February 27, 2015, the 4-H History Preservation website received it’s 100,000th visitor from the United States! When you add in the number of visitors from around the world, we’ve had 103,195!

While we don’t get as much traffic as Google, the preservation of the history of 4-H is no less important.

We started keeping track of the number of visitors on September 10, 2011. Over the past 3 years 5 months and 17 days, our site has had guests not only from the United States, but also from 154 countries around the world. This all works out to someone visiting the site every 2-3 minutes of every day of every week of every month of every year since we started keeping track.

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