A decade and a half ago, there was a vigorous campaign for the establishment of university extension throughout the United States. Generally speaking the campaign was a losing one—with but a few successes amid general failure. But many years before this agitation, there was begun a work among farmers, which in form and spirit was university extension, and which has constantly developed until it is today one of the most potent among the forces making for rural progress. This work has been done chiefly by what are now universally known as farmers' institutes.

The typical farmers' institute is a meeting usually lasting two days, held for the purpose of discussing subjects that relate to the interests of farmers, more particularly those of a practical character. As a rule, the speakers to whom set topics are assigned are composed of two classes: the first class is made up of experts, either professors or experimenters in agricultural colleges and similar institutions, or practical farmers who have made such a study of, and such a conspicuous success in, some branch of agriculture that they may well be called experts; the second class comprises farmers living in the locality in which the institute is held. The experts are expected to understand general principles or methods, and the local speakers the conditions peculiar to the neighborhood.

The meeting usually begins in the forenoon and ends with the afternoon session of the second day—five sessions being held. As a rule, not over two or three separate topics are treated in any one session, and in a well-planned institute topics of a like character are grouped together, so that there may be a fruit session, a dairy session, etc. Each topic is commonly introduced by a talk or paper of twenty to forty minutes' length. This is followed by a general discussion in which those in the audience are invited to ask questions of the speaker relevant to the topic under consideration, or to express opinions and give experiences of their own.

This is a rough outline of the average farmers' institute, but of course there are many variations. There are one-day meetings and there are three-day meetings, and in recent years the one-day meetings have grown in favor; in some states local speakers take little part; in some institutes a question-box is a very prominent feature, in others it is omitted altogether; in some cases the evening programme is made up of educational topics, or of home topics, or is even arranged largely for amusement; in other instances the evening session is omitted. In most institutes women are recognized through programme topics of special interest to them.

It is not important to trace the early history of the farmers' institute movement, and indeed it is not very easy to say precisely when and where the modern institute originated. Farmers' meetings of various sorts were held early in the century. As far back as 1853 the secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Agriculture recommended that farmers' institutes be made an established means of agricultural education. By 1871 Illinois and Iowa held meetings called farmers' institutes, itinerant in character, and designed to call together both experts and farmers, but neither state kept up the work systematically. Both Vermont and New Hampshire have held institutes annually since 1871, though they did not bear that name in the early years. Michigan has a unique record, having held regularly, since 1876, annual farmers' institutes, "so known and designated," which always have contained practically the essential features of the present-day institute. The Michigan legislature passed a law in 1861 providing for "lectures to others than students of the Agricultural College," and has made biennial appropriations for institutes since 1877. Ohio, in 1881, extended the institute idea to include every county in the state.

More important than the origin of the farmers' institute movement is the present status. Practically every state and territory in the Union carries on institutes under some form or other. In somewhat more than half the states, the authorities of the land-grant colleges have charge of the work. In the other states, the board of agriculture or the department of agriculture has control.

In 1905-6 there were held 3,500 institutes, in 45 states and territories, with a total reported attendance of 1,300,000 people, at a cost of nearly $350,000. The work is largely supported by the state treasuries, some of the states showing a most generous spirit. The annual state appropriations for the work in leading institute states are as follows: Pennsylvania, $20,500; New York, $20,000; Minnesota, $18,000; Illinois, $17,150; Ohio, $16,747; Wisconsin, $12,000; Indiana, $10,000. In these states practically every county has annually from one to five institutes.

Institutes in no two states are managed in the same way, but the system has fitted itself to local notions and perhaps to local needs. A rough division may be made—those states which have some form of central control and those which do not have. Even among states having a central management are found all degrees of centralization; Wisconsin and Ohio may be taken as the extremes. In Wisconsin the director of institutes, who is an employee of the university, has practically complete charge of the institutes. He assigns the places where the meetings are to be held, basing his decision upon the location of former institutes in the various counties, upon the eagerness which the neighborhoods seem to manifest toward securing the institute, etc. He arranges the programme for each meeting, suiting the topics and speakers to local needs, prepares advertising materials, and sets the dates of the meeting. A local correspondent looks after a proper hall for meeting, distributes the advertising posters, and bears a certain responsibility for the success of the institute. Meetings are arranged in series, and a corps of two or three lecturers is sent by the director upon a week's tour. One of these lecturers is called a conductor. He usually presides over the institute and keeps the discussions in proper channels. Practice makes him an expert. The state lecturers do most of the talking. Local speakers do not bear any large share in the programme. Questions are freely asked, however.

Ohio has an institute society in each county, and this society largely controls its own institutes. The secretary of the State Board of Agriculture, who has charge of the system, assigns dates and speakers to each institute. After that everything is in the hands of the local society, which chooses the topics to be presented by the state speakers, advertises the meeting, and the society president acts as presiding officer. Local speakers usually occupy half the time.

It does not seem as if either of these plans in its entirety were ideal—the one an extreme of centralized control, the other an extreme of local management. Yet in practice both plans work well. No states in the Union have better institutes nor better results from institute work than Wisconsin and Ohio. Skill, intelligence, and tact count for more than particular institutions.

New York may be said to follow the Wisconsin plan. Minnesota goes even a step farther; instead of holding several series of institutes simultaneously in different parts of the state, attended by different "crews," the whole corps of state speakers attends every institute. No set programmes are arranged. Everything depends upon local conditions. This system is expensive, but under present guidance very effective. Michigan, Indiana, and Pennsylvania have adopted systems which are a mean between the plan of centralization and the plan of localization. Illinois has a plan admirably designed to encourage local interest, while providing for central management.

Few other states have carried institute work so far as the states already named, and in some cases there seems to be a prejudice against a well-centralized and fully-developed system—a feeling that each locality may be self-sufficing in institute work. But this attitude is wearing away, for experience serves to demonstrate fully the value of system. The danger of centralization is bureaucracy; but in institute work, if the management fails to provide for local needs, and to furnish acceptable speakers, vigorous protests soon correct the aberration.

It has been stated that in America we have no educational system—that spontaneity is the dominant feature of American education. This is certainly true of farmers' institutes. So it has transpired that numerous special features have come in to use in various states—features of value and interest. It may be worth while to suggest some of the more characteristic of these features, without attempting an exact category.

Formerly the only way in which women were recognized at the institutes was by home and social topics on the programme, though women have always attended the meetings freely. Some years ago Minnesota and Wisconsin added women speakers to their list of state speakers, and in the case of Wisconsin, at least, held a separate session for women, simultaneously with one or two sessions of the regular institute, with demonstration lectures in cooking as the chief features. Michigan holds "women's sections" in connection with institutes, but general topics are taken up. In Ontario separate women's institutes have been organized. In Illinois a State Association of Domestic Science has grown out of the institutes. Thus institute work has broadened to the advantage of farm women.

At many institutes there are exhibits of farm and domestic products—a sort of midwinter fair. Oftentimes the merchants of the town in which the institute is held offer premiums as an inducement to the farmers.

In Wisconsin an educational feature of much value takes the form of stock-judging—usually at the regular autumn fairs. The judges give their reasons for their decisions, thus emphasizing the qualities that go to make up a perfect or desirable animal.

In several states there is held an annual state institute called a "round-up," "closing institute," or the like. It is intended to be a largely attended and representative state convention of agriculturists, for the purpose of discussing topics of general interest to men and women from the farms. These meetings are frequently very large and enthusiastic gatherings.

The county institute society is a part of the organization in some instances very well developed. It gives permanency to the work and arouses local interest and pride.

The development of men and women into suitable state speakers is an interesting phase. As a rule the most acceptable speakers are men who have made a success in some branch of farming, and who also have cultivated the gift of clear and simple expression. Not a few of these men become adepts in public speaking and achieve a reputation outside of their own states. In several states there is held a "normal institute"—an autumn meeting lasting a week or two weeks, and bringing together, usually at the state college of agriculture, the men who are to give the lectures at the institutes of the winter to follow. The object of the gathering is to bring the lecturers into close contact with the latest things in agricultural science, and to train them for more effective work.

A few years ago the United States Department of Agriculture employed an experienced institute director to give all his time to the study and promotion of farmers' institutes. This incident is suggestive of the important place which institutes have secured in the work for better farming.

The results of a generation of institute work are not easy to summarize. It is safe to make a broad generalization by asserting that this form of agricultural education has contributed in a remarkable degree to better farming. The best methods of farming have been advocated from the institute platform. Agricultural college professors, and agricultural experimenters have talked of the relations of science to practical farming. The farmers have come to depend upon the institute as a means for gaining up-to-date information.

And if institutes have informed, they have also done what is still better—they have inspired. They have gone into many a dormant farm community and awakened the whole neighborhood to a quicker life. They have started discussions, set men thinking, brought in a breath of fresh air. They have given to many a farmer an opportunity for self-development as a ready speaker.

Other educational agencies, such as the agricultural colleges and experiment stations, have profited by institutes. No one thing has done more than the institutes to popularize agricultural education, to stir up interest in the colleges, to make the farmers feel in touch with the scientists.

Farmers' institutes are a phase of university extension, and it is as a part of the extension movement that they are bound to increase in value and importance. Reading-courses and correspondence-courses are growing factors in this extension movement, but the power of the spoken word is guarantee that the farmers' institute cannot be superseded in fact. And it is worth noting again, that while university extension has not been the success in this country which its friends of a decade ago fondly prophesied for it, its humbler cousin—agricultural college extension—has been a conspicuous success, and is acquiring a constantly increasing power among the educational agencies that are trying to deal with the farm problem.