Photos Preserve 4-H History

Posted on September 14, 2015 by Jim Kahler

The following story is from the July 2015 issue of the 4-H History Preservation Newsletter

In the digital age we can easily capture a special moment with a smart phone, tablet, camera or even a watch. At the turn of the 20th century when 4-H was starting, amateur photography was gaining popularity thanks to recent innovations of smaller cameras and photographic film.

An article in the July/August, 1938, National 4-H News entitled “Thrills for Camera Fans” recounts the experiences of delegates to the recent National 4-H Club Camp in Washington, DC, taking pictures of famous buildings, historic sites and camp life.

1928 4-H National 4-H Club Conference delegates line up to photograph Mount Vernon.

The article notes that lots of photos – and even a few movies – were taken at Mt. Vernon. Delegates took a boat ride on the Potomac to George Washington’s home. The Capitol, Lincoln Memorial and other Washington, DC, monuments were also popular.

Before departing, delegates promised their new friends that they’d get prints made to send after returning home.

Over the years, photography became a popular 4-H project. Kodak was a partner in developing national 4-H project guides, and they sponsored the 4-H Photography National Awards program. National 4-H Council invited 4-H photographers to send their best photographs for the National 4-H Photography Contests; winners were featured in the National 4-H Calendars and displayed at events across the country. In recent years video has been included in the 4-H project portfolio.

We rely a lot on photos to help tell the stories of the people, places and events in our 4-H history. Does your club have someone like a 4-H Historian to take photographs of your club members, meetings and special events? Often these photos are compiled into a club scrapbook. National 4-H Week and 4-H Achievement Nights are great times to make displays of your 4-H club photos. Leaders and parents can bring their 4-H photos to tell the club about their special 4-H memories. Always be prepared to capture your 4-H history in photographs. If your club has scrapbooks from past years it might also be interesting to compare the photos from past years with those from this year. Or you could make an exhibit of your club’s history at the local library, county fair or achievement night.

From a 4-H Clover Poster to . . .

Posted on September 10, 2015 by Sue Benedetti

For those who shop on the 4-H Mall, you’ll be happy to hear that this 90-year-old 4-H institution has created a “mini-store” called the 4-H StoreFront that now accepts PayPal as well as other major credit cards. The 4-H StoreFront features a small selection of the 4-H Mall product listing, but the list of products available there will continue to grow over the coming months. To visit their new shopping channel, visit http://4-HStoreFront.com

Additionally, the 4-H StoreFront site also allows for the purchase and redemption of gift cards. These gift cards can only be purchased and redeemed on the 4-H StoreFront site. The gift cards are digital and are available in increments of $10, $25, $50, and $100.

The National 4-H Supply Service was launched in 1925 by the National Committee on Boys’ and Girls’ Club Work as a central, non-profit source of supplies, furnishing members and leaders with the pins, labels and stickers they needed to foster a sense of belonging and public awareness of the 4-H movement.

The Supply Service’s very first item was a color poster of the 4-H clover which had gained support through the efforts of Gertrude Warren and other extension leaders as the insignia of boys’ and girls’ club work.

To learn more about the history of this important resource to the 4-H Program; visit
http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History/Supply_Service/

Traveling with 4-H – Hands-on 4-H History

Posted on September 8, 2015 by Jim Kahler

In 1959, Iowa 4-H’ers travelled by bus for an exchange program with Kentucky 4-H. Since the National 4-H Center had just been opened they decided to keep going to see what was there and asked 4-H Center staff to plan a program for them. And the rest, as they say, is history. That trip resulted in the development of Citizenship Short Course (CSC) as it was called until the early 1970s when it was renamed Citizenship Washington Focus (CWF).

Going to new places through 4-H was a highlight 70 years ago just as it is today. Through 4-H trips, members visit new places and meet other 4-H members who may be from a different county or state. The June 1945 issue of National 4-H Club News mentions a number of 4-H travel opportunities.

Camp is one of the first trips that young 4-H members take. In that year, Vermont was raising funds to establish two or three regional 4-H camps. The 4-H clubs in each of the 11 counties were asked to contribute $20 toward this effort. Louisiana had scheduled 10 camps during their 23 years of camping, and Montana planned 15 camps to serve their 21 counties.

An article by Dr. Clarence Smith, early Chief of Cooperative Extension at USDA, extolled the importance of trips to state and national events like 4-H Club Congress and National 4-H Club Camp (now National 4-H Conference). However, he noted that trips and scholarships are subordinate to doing your best in project work. He said, “The better you do your project work, the more you give of yourself to your club and the more you bring back from adventures which come to enterprising club members.”

Some states offer 4-H international travel experiences. “The thrill of a lifetime” was had by 24 Texas 4-H club boys who drove into Mexico for a 10-day tour of “Old Mexico.” They were to meet with youth their age, visit demonstrations of agriculture, tour the world’s richest silver mine and visit remnants of the country’s ancient past.

Hands-On 4-H History

There are many travel experiences that you can have in 4-H at the county, state, national or international level. Your club may not know about all of them. Have any 4-H members, leaders or parents taken a 4-H trip? Ask them to share their experiences with the club. Perhaps you can mark these on a map (see related story in this issue on the National 4-H Mapping Project). What trips are offered in your state? Ask several members to research what they are to report to the club. As Dr. Smith advised, trips are the result of good 4-H work, and the benefits to those experiences can enrich both those who travel and their fellow club members.

Having started a 4-H camping program in 1915, West Virginia is celebrating its camping centennial this year with year-long commemorative events and special camp activities. (Editor’s note: An article on their activities is in the works for a coming issue of this Newsletter.)

From 1948 until recently, the National 4-H Foundation (now National 4-H Council) and USDA jointly administered the International Farm Youth Exchange – IFYE (later the International 4-H Youth Exchange). 4-H international exchanges with 19 participating states are now administered by States’ 4-H International Exchange Programs, 1601 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2230, Seattle, WA 98101, 800-407-3314, www.States4HExchange.org

4-H Hands-on History: 4-H Entrepeneurship

Posted on August 28, 2015 by Jim Kahler

Peter Drucker, author and management consultant, once said, “Entrepreneurship is neither a science nor an art. It is a practice.” The Uncle Sam’s Helping Nieces 4-H Club in Philadelphia, NY, started practicing at a young age by opening a store in their local Grange Hall. The enterprising group of girls was featured in the August, 1944, issue of National 4-H Club News.

To raise money for the club and help their community during

WWII, the members held a weekly rummage sale from their store. The girls collected clothes that had been outgrown or were otherwise unwanted. Sometimes they used their sewing skills to make minor repairs to holes or buttons or to give a garment a fresh look by adding lace or colorful touches of fabric from their scrap bag. They collected old jewelry to send to soldiers overseas to use as barter.

The girls were responsible for selling the items and keeping proper financial records. A member who was leaving the club donated an old wagon. The club painted it green and white and used it to make collections of items to sell.

The money earned in their store was used for 4-H camp scholarships and other club purposes.

Do you have any entrepreneurs in your club? Give it a try and find out! There are 4-H entrepreneurship 4-H activity and helper’s guides available from National 4-H Supply (4-H Mall) and some state 4-H programs.

Discuss in your club ideas for starting an entrepreneurship project. What items or services might you provide? How would you manage your business and the funds earned? The 4-H entrepreneurship materials will guide you through the process of planning, preparing, implementing and finishing a 4-H business.

You can have a successful 4-H business like the Uncle Sam’s Helping Nieces4-H club did over 70 years ago.

1904 World’s Fair Boys’ Corn Pyramid

Posted on August 26, 2015 by Larry Krug

The following story is from the National Compendium of 4-H Promotion and Visibility on the National 4-H History website at

http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History/4-H_Promotion/

There are several historical references to Will Otwell’s corn-growing boys in Illinois and beyond in the early history of Corn Clubs in the US; the story of Otwell’s creativity from 1904 is definitely a noteworthy story worth repeating.

Will Otwell was a simple, local nurseryman in Macoupin County, Illinois. He was president of the county Farmer’s Institute which had sponsored an annual county corn contest for farm boys for two or three years, each year getting a bit more successful. In 1903 Illinois Governor Richard Yates (over Otwell’s protest) gave him the responsibility of creating an exhibit representing Illinois at the great 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exhibition in St. Louis. The prospect appalled the farm-bred man from Carlinville. He knew that famed artists would create beautiful displays for other states. What could he do to match them?

Then he struck upon the idea of holding a boys’ corn contest, this time state-wide. Otwell extended the contest to include 50,000 entrants. In the fall of 1903, Otwell and his associates in Carlinville were busy opening packages of 10-ear entries of corn, drying them out, and repacking them for shipment to the Agricultural Palace at St. Louis. They sent down the best 1,250 samples from the contestants along with 600 photographs of the young farmers. This made up the bulk of the exhibit.

Exhibition visitors came upon the sight of two huge pyramids of corn – one of yellow corn and the other of white – arranged neatly in 10-ear samples. Above the pyramids were signs reading “Grown by the Farmer Boys of Illinois!” and “8,000 Farm Boys in Contest.” The fact that hundreds of samples were adorned with the pictures of the boys who grew them added the personal touch. The result: the Illinois corn display literally stole the show from the other states.

PIC_017

When newspapermen at the World’s Fair learned that each morning Will Otwell was getting approximately a bushel basket full of mail from his youthful contestants, they literally overwhelmed him for stories. The newspapers and magazines from around the country carried about 2,000 special articles about the pyramid of corn from Illinois. The display received so much attention that Otwell received offers from foreign countries to stage similar contests there.

Always “raising the bar,” in 1905 Otwell invited farm youth from anywhere in the country to come to Carlinville for a national roundup of corn growing contestants in his home town.

A Dinner to Remember… Words Never to Forget

Posted on August 24, 2015 by Larry Krug

The following story is from the National Compendium of 4-H Promotion and Visibility on the National 4-H History website at

http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History/4-H_Promotion/

This story was published in National 4-H News following the 1947 National 4-H Club Congress, written by Robert Chesnutt, Assistant Extension Editor, Alabama.

The theme of this story about our Alabama delegates could be repeated over and over by others struck with the eagerness of youth to accept new ideas, encouragement, strong leadership.

Our boys and girls hadn’t missed a session, not even a word uttered by outstanding speakers. They absorbed the entire program. I know. They talked with me about every meeting.

Then at one of the dinners given by a generous sponsor, their enthusiasm was fired higher and higher. It reached the bubbling-over point. At this event rumor got around that top-flight athletes would appear on the evening program. Immediately every member of our group wanted autographs. They soon located Charlie Trippi, Chicago Cardinals, and Ted Williams, Boston Red Sox (both later Hall of Famers) at the table across the spacious Stevens Hotel Ballroom.

They got the signatures and then said they would be ever-grateful if the stars would pose for a picture with them. True sports that they are, Trippi and Williams laid down their forks and obliged. That was the happiest bunch of boys I ever photographed.

After dinner, the two stars, plus a dozen more in all fields of sports, talked to the Congress folks. None hung more closely to their words than did our Alabama delegates:

“Fair play”… “Play to win”… “Be a good looser; a gracious winner”… “Practice, practice, practice”… “Keep working, keep trying”… “Study and plan; use your mind as well as your muscles”… “Practice, and then keep practicing.”

Upon receptive, eager ears fell these lines that had followed other inspiring words of a dozen speakers of previous days. They were drunk, deeply drunk, by kids who would hold on to them forever. Those words and those boys and girls became inseparable. Neither could escape from the other.

The ringing challenge would return later down in some Alabama cotton field. It would come again to haunt and inspire a boy who found his beef cattle project heart-breakingly tough. It would sound again and thrill a wisp of a girl whose eyes were filled with sweat from standing over a red hot stove, canning food for winter. Yes, some words never die. They become as much of the one inspired as he is of himself.

Deeply moved, the boys and girls questioned me: “I’ve heard the same words before – but this week they really did something to me”… “Everybody’s got a chance to do big things, they said, and I believe it”… “The only person who can stop you is yourself,” said another. “That’s what those speeches meant to me”… “I’ll never forget – and I’m going to make more out of myself. I’m going to be a winner.”

Those were some of the things the sincerest kids I ever knew told me that night.

Couple of days later 14-year-old Nimrod Garth looked at the international’s grand champion steer and unwaveringly volunteered, “I can grow out one just as good. It may take a long, long time, but I am going to do it.”

Nimrod, already a State champion, was echoing the spirit he found at the Congress. Perhaps he would have said the same, Congress or no Congress, but I can’t think so.

Making the last lap of the journey home by car, I was seated next to Lucille May, from the red hills of remote Randolph county. She was quiet, weighing something in her bright, energetic mind. Then Lucille turned to Mary Dell McCain, State girls leader. “Some day I am going to be the national achievement winner,” she announced quietly. “I’ve worked hard for nine years to be State best record winner. Now I’m aiming for what I think is the greatest 4-H honor. I’m going to help younger girls with their 4-H work and make myself a winner.”

Lucille said it in a matter-of-fact way. But meant every word. Knowing how far down the line she started and how high she’s climbed, I say she’ll do it, too.

The words and inspired faces remind me over and over that at every crossroad are growing our future wealth.

How well we succeed lies in how well we kindle in our youth the fire that keeps them pushing towards new victories in the smaller accomplishments in life: Sewing a better dress, canning a better jar of food, growing better corn, taking a fuller part in leadership.

Inspiration may come at a National Congress – but just as surely it may come in the smallest 4-H meeting; or at a home visit by the county Extension agent; or when an older member helps a beginner.

When or where youth is inspired is not important. The fact that they can be as inspired as their leaders have the vision to make them is the secret to better 4-H work – and a better world.

"Mulligan Stew" Made 4-H Television History

Posted on August 21, 2015 by Sue Benedetti

Produced in 1972 and released in 1973, “Mulligan Stew” was not the first 4-H TV series, but it stimulated an extraordinary increase in 4-H enrollment at the time.

The series of six half-hour programs centered on a kids’ rock band that “turns on” to good nutrition by – a la “Mission Impossible” – solving a different type of nutrition problem in each episode. It was developed and produced by Extension Service/USDA, and filmed by USDA Motion Picture Service, based on work by Developmental Committees and Iowa State University Extension Service 4-H Nutrition Television Programs, with a grant from the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP).

Member project book for television viewers.

Eleanor L. Wilson, national 4-H TV coordinator at the time, recalls that the 4-H TV Developmental Committee liked what Iowa State did with nutrition content, but the series did not emerge as a creative whole until Ira Klugerman was hired to direct the show. Klugerman, with a background of children’s television at WQED in Pittsburgh, came up with the title and general treatment.

Production began on location in Washington, DC in 1971. Besides budget concerns which Wilson managed, nutrition content had to meet existing standards.

Sue Kleen Benedetti, Home Economics Information Specialist at the time, was named along with Wilson as Technical Director to assure that everything was nutritionally correct. Benedetti chose, prepared and staged food for the home scenes. The child actors were sometimes difficult and Wilson recalled that when she was not juggling budgets, she was settling arguments on the set or haunting local produce markets looking for just the right shade of green vegetables for the next day’s shooting.

“Mulligan Stew” premiered October 4, 1972, during National 4-H Week at the National 4-H Center, but it was already a winner. Advance information had enticed the states and they were lining up their viewing schedules and stockpiling materials. The series included the six half-hour films, leaders’ guides, and a “Mulligan Stew” comic-book developed by Michigan State University. “Mulligan Stew” was promoted and distributed through the National 4-H Service Committee, and Television Specialist Larry L. Krug recalls the comic-book printer’s reaction: “We placed an initial order for one million copies of the comic book and before they got them off the presses I had to call back and order another one and a half million. They thought I was crazy. Before the series was completed we had printed over seven million copies of the ‘Mulligan Stew’ comic-book.” Cooperative Extension Service invested $716,000 in “Mulligan Stew,” or about $1 per child enrolled, compared to the $10.48 cost of enrolling a child in a single 4-H project at that time.

A 4-H member from McConnelsville, Ohio, summed up the series’ appeal when he wrote, “Dear Mulligan Stew, Thank You for putting on the show. It taught me a lot about nutrition. My little brother watched it and is eating better now. I hope you will show it again next year. It was funny too.” From letters like that it was apparent that the series had succeeded in promoting concepts of good nutrition in an educational – yet fun – way, and the series very significantly increased 4-H enrollment at the time.

To learn more about the “Mulligan Stew” TV series, please visit http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History/Television/

Mobile 4-H History Map Shared with Huge International Audience

Posted on August 19, 2015 by Tom Tate

The following story is from the August 2015 issue of the 4-H History Preservation Newsletter

4-H youth geospatial map-makers shared their 4-H History map with thousands of professional cartographers from around the world.

In July 4-H Youth and adult leaders from seven states shared their new 4-H History map with thousands of professional map-makers from around the world.

The new 4-H project was launched during the Esri International Conference in San Diego July 18-22. The 2015 National 4-H Geospatial Leadership Team of youth and adult leaders exhibited their map to 16,000 attendees from 120 countries at the San Diego convention. Team members from CA, IA, MT, NC, NY, MD, and TN, showed attendees how 4-H families will be using mobile technology to discover and visit historically significant locations where national, state and local milestones in 4-H history took place.

To see what the conference attendees saw you can visit http://4-HHistoryPreservation.com/History_Map

Several of the professional map-makers visiting the 4-H Youth Community Mapping exhibit were former 4-H’ers and were highly interested to see which 4-Hhistorical items might be posted in the states where they were members or where they live now.

Zooming in on California, National 4-H History Map users saw a Ferris Wheel near San Francisco. When they clicked on it, they uncovered the 100 year history of 4-H and the Alameda County fair. There, they found a youth-produced film made in 2014, celebrating the 100th Anniversary of 4-H and the Alameda County Fair, both of which were
viewable through the Map. A former Indiana 4-H’er spotted a symbol of an interesting person in 4-H history appearing in the middle of his state; it was the location where the first Saturday morning 4-H TV show was hosted by a young media host, David Letterman, who went on to be a famous national network TV star.

A former 4-H’er from South Carolina found a historical marker noting the importance of US Congressman Asbury Francis Lever, whose national legislation in 1914 provided national resources through Cooperative Extension to support 4-H Youth Development for years to come.

A former 4-H’er from Wyoming noted that there were no historical 4-H sites in Wyoming. He was quick to say, “I want to nominate my favorite 4-H memory to the map, as soon as I get home.” Massachusetts visitors found a variety of 4-H campgrounds and fair grounds that triggered thoughts of many memorable 4-H sites they would like to re-visit.

During the Fall of 2015 and into the future, thousands of 4-H clubs will nominate interesting national, state and local 4-H historical people, places and events for documentation on the National 4-H History Map. We encourage you to look at your local area and county and see which, if any, 4-H History sites have already been nominated. If your county has no historical 4-H location yet posted, please let us know, so we can help you get started.

4-H Alumni attending the Esri International Mapping Conference
last month were encouraged to map their 4-H History.

For more information, please contact:
Tom Tate TateAce@aol.com

Jason Rine Jason.Rine@mail.wvu.edu

Early Roots of 4-H Education Philosophy

Posted on August 13, 2015 by Larry Krug

The following story is from the July 2015 issue of the 4-H History Preservation Newsletter

During the 1890s, progressive educators were beginning to promote the idea that teachers need to be teaching more than the three Rs (readin’, ‘ritin’ and ‘rithmetic). In fact, M. Buisson of the French Ministry of Education, speaking at the International Congress of Education at Chicago on July 26, 1893, said: “Let the school teach, we say, what is most likely to prepare the child to be a good citizen, an intelligent and active man. Not by the means of the three Rs, but rather by the means of the three Hs – head, heart and hand – and make him fit for self-government, self-control and self-help, a living, a thinking being.” (Page 263 of the proceedings of the National Education Association for 1893)

A few educators were beginning to grasp what Buisson was talking about. Liberty Hyde Bailey, a naturalist at Cornell, was offering nature studies to young people in the 1890s that closely resembled 4-H work of later years. Perry Holden, known as the father of hybrid corn and the nation’s first agronomist, first at the University of Illinois and then at Iowa State College, was almost evangelical in his quest to get small businessmen and bankers involved in financially supporting young people with project loans. At the turn of the century, a few superintendents of schools and some of the landgrant colleges were coming on board. In 1902, W. M. Beardshear, President of Iowa State College and President of the National Education Association, gave a speech on “The Three Hs in Education” and stated “We are coming to embody Buisson’s definition of education, and harmoniously build up the character of the child.” Yet, there was no organized plan, no organized movement. It seems almost as if it happened through “little clusters of people” standing around talking about these three Hs, nodding their heads up and down and saying, “this is a good idea,” but it was moving ever so slowly. What they drastically needed was a great public relations person, a person who could present their case to the media. But 4-H promotion and visibility was not yet on the horizon.

P_Holden L_H_Bailey W_M_Bearshear

4-H History Preservation News

Photos Preserve 4-H History

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From a 4-H Clover Poster to . . .

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Traveling with 4-H – Hands-on 4-H History

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1904 World’s Fair Boys’ Corn Pyramid

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A Dinner to Remember… Words Never to Forget

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"Mulligan Stew" Made 4-H Television History

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Most Washingtonians (DC types) leave town in August because of the heat, but your 4-H History Team is still here!

Record Amount of 4-H Enrollment

People Who Made 4-H Great

Entrepreneurship in 4-H Clubs

Corn Clubs at 1904 World’s Fair

National 4-H History Map Unveiled

Mulligan Stew Made 4-H Television History

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