Lena Williams, age 16, of Washington County, Tex., has learned to can vegetables and make jelly and pickles so well that her services are in great demand. This year, after attending to her work at home and keeping up her club activities, Lena made a profit of $63 by canning for other people and even a greater profit from the sale of some of her products, both canned and fresh. With this money she bought a purebred Poland China pig, costing $10, and 12 purebred Rhode Island Red pullets and 1 cockerel, costing $14. Lena also attributes her good fortune in having some good warm, tasty apparel for school to her activity in canning, as she invested the remaining $39 in clothes for school wear, and plans to start a bank account from her investment in chickens and pigs.
It should be noted that any girl club member who makes the right start in productive enterprises is almost sure to go ahead into other phases of better home making and self-improvement. It is therefore very essential to make the proper start. The initial stage from the viewpoint of the demonstrator is most vital. The importance of the starting point was emphasized by Seaman A. Knapp, when he said:
Where to commence is the first problem of reform. Shall we trust the people and commence by increasing their resources, or shall our efforts be directed to improving farm dwellings and home conditions, the construction of better highways, the introduction of the telephone, rural free delivery, a community library, or improved social and religious privileges? Evidently it depends upon the degree of advancement in rural communities. The remedy that would help one might be utterly unapplicable to another. For example, if it were found that the average farmer in a rural township lived in a house valued at about $100, without barn, garden, cow, or pasture, with an insufficient supply of poultry, and unable to read and heavily involved in debt, it would be the height of unwisdom to commence the rural uplift by establishing a public library or even a school. The rural toilers must be first properly nourished, clothed, and housed. It is the order of greatest necessity. The means to do this can not be given to them and if it were, there would be no uplift. They must be shown how to earn it by a better tillage of the soil, and how to husband their earnings by greater thrift. A low wage, a small amount of work accomplished in a day, and an uneconomic use of resources are a part of any civilization limited by a low earning capacity.
No more frequent mistake is made than to assume that the low wage is the result of oppression. As a rule the wage is determined by the accomplishment. In India it requires from 14 to 24 servants to do the work of a small household, where 2 would do it better in some portions of the United States.
Upon the farm one man in the United States with a good team and modern machinery can do the work that 50 to 100 men do in many oriental countries. Consequently, when oriental farm laborers are paid 5 to 10 cents per day they are paid up to their earning capacity and that capacity is insufficient to sustain a high civilization.... In attempting to raise the condition of the colored man, we frequently start too high up, and in talking of the higher progress talk right over his head. When I talk to a negro citizen I never talk about the better civilization, but about a better chicken, a better pig, or a whitewashed house.
DEMONSTRATION RESULTS
At the close of the first decade of negro extension under the Smith-Lever Act, it is well to make permanent record of some of the achievements of the negroes in extension work, not only as a matter of recognition and commendation, but also to set up milestones to mark progress. At the close of the next decade these figures will have even greater interest than now. In fact, they will increase in importance and value with the passing of time.
The statistics which follow are not complete because they pertain to the activities of negro agents only. Hundreds of white agents have done some work with negroes, which is not reported separately. It is probably safe to say that the numbers represented in the 1924 report might be doubled. Since a system of extension work for negroes by negroes has been evolved, the tendency has been to turn the responsibility over to negro agents. The most harmonious relations prevail between white and negro agents in all the States and white agents always stand ready to advise and help.
FARM DEMONSTRATION WORK
During the calendar year 1924, 3,659 negro farmers undertook demonstrations with cotton and 3,072 carried the work to completion and submitted reports. These demonstrations represented a total of 23,043 acres. In addition, 2,630 junior club members planted an acre or more of cotton and 1,734 of them completed the work and submitted reports. Many of these boys cleared more than $100 each on their acres and some more than $200. This is not bad for boys who attend school regularly. Making the usual allowance of about 140 work hours in a year in the production and harvesting of an acre of cotton, these club members earned an average of about $1 an hour for every hour they worked.