Rural Revelry

(See front cover)

Under the Sign of the Ram, the Bull, the Twins, the Crab and the Lion John Farmer toils and sweats through spring and summer from dawn to dusk. But under Virgo, when the sun slants toward its autumnal solstice, he lays down his tools and turns his thoughts to rest and fun. Last week as August gave way to September the time had come for the gala event of the farm year--the State Fair. In twelve great agricultural states the exciting aroma of hot dogs filled the noses, the brave piping of calliopes filled the ears and the bright glare of rockets filled the eyes of some 3,000,000 U. S. country folk celebrating Fair Week. September would not see the end of this rural revelry, for the South, busy with its tobacco and cotton, cannot frolic much before frost.

No graph or chart better reflects the success of the farm year than the receipts and attendance figures at State Fairs. What with government bounties and higher agricultural prices, last year was a whopper, best since Depression. Attendance records were well over the 1931-33 figure and, more significantly, carnival show operators reported business increases ranging from 12% at the Illinois Fair to 75% at the Colorado Fair.

With this record to shoot at, agronomists, farm journalists and Fair officials unanimously predicted that this year's Fair business would knock the spots off last year's. The Corn Belt Farm Dailies glowed with rays of "business sunshine." thanked God for good weather, the Government for good prices. These two factors were responsible for a grain crop up 80% over drought-stricken 1934, for cattle which, fattened on sweet lush grass, were selling $2 per cwt. higher in Chicago than a year ago. In Editor & Publisher, which issued a special supplement full of good farm news. Secretary of Agriculture Henry Agard Wallace estimated that this year's farm cash income would top last year's $6,200,000,000 by $500,000,000, a little more than half that of the 1920's, but close to twice that of 1932. And from the State Fairs themselves rang a jubilant affirmation of better times for the farmer:

P:At the Illinois State Fair at Springfield, Greyhound broke the world's record for 3-year-old geldings by trotting a mile in 2 min. flat (TIME, Aug. 23). Carnivals grossed $50,000 for an all-time record. Attendance was up to 810,000 which was 175,000 more than last year.

P:At Milwaukee, the Wisconsin State Fair featured the nation's greatest dairy cattle show, a children's milk-drinking contest for the first 1,000 arrivals, a two-ton cheese rated 93% perfect, and an attendance which topped the 1921 high.

P:The California State Fair in Sacramento hoped to overcome the competition of the San Diego Exposition with such features as pari-mutuel betting at horse races and equestrianism.

P:In Lincoln, "The Holy City" to many Nebraskans, the board of the Nebraska State Fair, in the hole for the past three years, put on horse races, announced that the betting windows "would be so concealed as not to be apparent to anyone not wanting to bet."

P:All opening day marks fell at Pueblo when 14,000 trooped into the Colorado State Fair.

P:For the first time in six years, all available exhibition space was rented at the New York State Fair at Syracuse. One of the oldest (95 years) and best attended (263,000 paid admissions, 10,000 unpaid). New York's celebration boasted its biggest horse show, a new $100,000 4-H livestock pavilion, a new prize for the best Belgian draft horse. At the spelling bee the winning moppet marred a perfect score by leaving the "t" off "cachet." Her consternation was no greater than that of young Eleanor Smithers of Ogdensburg, when asked to show her blue-ribbon Holstein calf, "Fineview Springbank Babe," to two famed stockmen, Owen D. Young and Caesar Kleberg, whose King Ranch in Texas is the world's largest. Governor Herbert Lehman told Fairgoers: "Control of prices, regulation of supplies and restrictions of movement and distribution of products . . . may be justified in times of great economic stress, but we should be careful that we do not project emergency measures into permanent activities."

Governor. City man though he is, New York's Lehman is well aware that the one "must" date on every Governor's calendar is his visit to his State's Fair. And of all the Governors who dutifully put in their appearances at State Fairs last week, none was so pleased or proud as Clyde LaVerne Herring of Iowa. To its citizens Iowa is the end Farm State of the Union and its State Fair the best anywhere. The smiles on the faces of his fellow-citizens which greeted Governor Herring as he marched through the Grand Avenue entrance of the Fair Grounds at Des Moines last week had been put there by a booming hog market, a corn crop 55% more abundant than last year's, an estimated farm income of $500,000,000. But Governor Herring, sombre, benign, snowy-crested, could recall days when there was not a smile in all Iowa.

Within six months after his inauguration in 1933, Governor Herring had gone through a farm strike led by Milo Reno. There was riot and martial law at Le Mars, where a State Judge who sanctioned mortgage foreclosures was dragged from his bench, nearly lynched (TIME, May 8, 1933). In desperation Governor Herring had proclaimed a farm mortgage moratorium, later called a conference of Midwestern Governors, led them to Washington.

Just why a rich, retiring realtor in his early 50's like Clyde Herring wanted to become Governor at such an unhappy time is hard to say. Born near Jackson, Mich., his first job was carrying bundles at a Jackson drygoods store for $1.50 a week. Soon he rode his bicycle 80 miles into Detroit to become a jewelry clerk. At 18 he fought Spain from Chickamauga, Ga. Later he raised cattle in Colorado, fattened them in Iowa, finally "realized that I could hire a man to do the work for $30 a month and do something else myself." In Detroit he had fixed Henry Ford's watch, thus came to know that rising automobile manufacturer. From 1910 until the distributing system was reshuffled after the War, Clyde Herring was Ford agent for Iowa. By that time he had acquired $3,000,000 worth of Des Moines real estate.

Clyde Herring ran for Governor in 1920 and lost. He ran for U. S. Senator in 1922 and lost. Ten years later political good fortune came his way for the first time. Today Iowans, predominantly rural and Republican, have grown fond of their urban, Democratic Governor. They like the way he putters around his garden and greenhouse, growing flowers for the poor in a Des Moines charity hospital.. They like his quiet voice, his modest ways. Typically last week Governor Herring spent all his time at the Fair looking at prize Hampshire sheep, Holstein cattle, watching the trotting races. He did not visit the Midway. Nor did he kiss any babies. One, aged 2, he accidentally bowled over, picked up as the child's father exclaimed: "He's a lucky kid. It isn't everyone who can be knocked down by the Governor." And Governor Herring made no speech. What he did keep saying over & over, however, was a solid economic fact of large significance to Iowa: "It's the greatest exposition in seven years. . . . Greatest in seven years. . . ."

Stock. Iowans recognize only one State Fair as a rival to theirs, that of Texas. But the Texas Fair lasts a fortnight, four days longer than Iowa's. State pride aside, the factor which might cause an unbiased observer to mark the Iowa State Fair No. 1 in the nation is its cattle show. Housed in six of the largest of the 21 Fair buildings last week were 6,000 head of cattle from 23 States. In addition, the 4-H Club stock show was the largest in the land with 1,600 animals.

In, the big ring just west of the Horse Barn and north of the Baby Beef Barn, judging went on all last week. There were Hampshire sheep whose tails had just been neatly cleaned by their owners. There were spotted Poland China sows whose great bellies and splotched hides looked like fat men in polka dots. There were Holstein bulls, their fine loose hides wrinkled about their necks like capes. For winners of the general stock show there was $70,000 in prize money. But this did not go into the pockets of ordinary Iowa farmers, who have no business with or use for a $50,000 champion bull. The champions are generally owned by professional breeders from all over the Union who tour the State Fair circuit not for pride but for profit. About the best the average Iowan hoped to pick up last week was $3 for the winning sample of potatoes, beets or alfalfa.

Few Iowa farmers, however, go to the Fair to see its cows, hay, pickles or even the elaborate farm machinery shows put on by Deere & Co., Chevrolet Motor Co., De Laval or Allis-Chalmers. Most of them go to meet friends, to eat taffy, to see the automobile races, to hear speeches, to watch plays, to ride roller-coasters and to have general non-professional fun. Biggest single attraction that packed thousands of Iowans onto the Fair Grounds at Des Moines last week, breaking 1934 attendance records almost daily and finally smashing last year's total, was the Midway.

Midway. Nobody ever got trampled inspecting a colt in the Horse Barn. But last week many a toe got stepped on while its owner ogled a filly named Jade Rhodora in that brawling half-moon of tents pitched east of the race track. Strip-Dancer Rhodora, who overnight became Des Moines' Sally Rand, took it all in the right spirit, announcing: "I wouldn't do a strip dance in a night club. ... I wouldn't do it at a stag affair either. This is different. The people are really good folks. They don't get to see much of this sort of thing and they get a thrill out of it."

There were plenty more thrills on the Midway, most of whose barkers solemnly swore that their shows were "right from the Century of Progress." "The Classics of 1935" offered for view a bevy of young women whom the barker introduced thus through his loudspeaker: "Ten little beauties, ten little models, undraped, unveiled and unashamed. . . . Human beauty in all its splendor and glory. . . ."

Not far away was a pitch arranged as a series of port holes. Signs peremptorily warned: CHILDREN UNDER 16 NOT ADMITTED and IF YOU CAN'T TAKE IT, DON'T COME IN. Those who could take it found displayed behind the portholes a collection of "art studies" clipped from smutty magazines, a picture of a sail boat and a view of "the execution of six by Chinese bandits."

On the non-sexual side, the Midway offered such attractions as a "jungle show" with some lions, "Percilla" the Monkey Girl and John Dillinger's father. In a permanent Old Mill shy bumpkins could kiss their rustic belles in the dark.

Spectacles. Meantime, for ten days and nights, the rest of the Fair Grounds was a whirlwind of exciting spectacles. The State amateur baseball championship was settled, while 4-H Club teams grunted through their Kittenball tournament. Back of the Live Stock building fiddlers squeaked in competition, while young men in knitted shirts pitched championship horseshoes. The Fair offered no greater sight than the team pulling contest. The first time F. F. Martin of Bridgewater tried to hitch his huge draft horses to the pulling machine (a truck rigged backwards) the beasts took fright when the doubletree dropped against their heels, tossed Owner Martin, bolted into the crowd. The next time they struck the earth with their hoofs until it trembled, tugged the truck down the course in short order to win the event.

Like the live stock exhibitors and carnival people, the trotting racers and speed car drivers make all the Fairs. Nowadays the auto races are three times as popular as the trotters, for the artful speedsters have learned to go through fences without injury, are able to provide a breath-taking accident almost every race. Most hairraising spectacle of all was provided last week by Daredevil "Clem" Sohnn "the bat man," who thrice ascended in an airplane, thrice leaped out in midair, soaring and looping toward earth on his canvas wings (TIME, March 11).

Plays, Paintings, Preserves. The substantial background behind all this hullabaloo was a vast miscellany of activities without which a Fair would not be a Fair. There were countless lectures by Iowa professors, social workers, Farm Bureau Federation executives on interior decoration, weaving, child psychology, farm plumbing, "Childhood Then & Now," "The Farm Woman A World Citizen." And on shelf after shelf, through aisle after aisle were stacked the products that Iowa's women had wrought from their gardens, cook stoves and work baskets. Nine hundred prizes were offered for twelve kinds of bread and rolls, 15 kinds of layer cake, 13 kinds of loaf cake, cookies, candy, popcorn balls, potato chips, spiced apples, pickles, jellies, jams, conserves, canned fruit, sun preserved fruits; for the best pillow case, cross-stitched spread, French knot spread, Cluny centerpiece, six-piece doily set, crocheted infants' socks, cutwork, Roman embroidery, boy's suit made from cast-off garments, rompers, Afghan, artificial flowers, pieced quilt, hand-painted cake plates (professional and amateur), fruit group, picnic table. Money winnings were small (first prize: $2), but eminently satisfying to the victor was the distinction of being known as a right smart housewife back home.

Also along with the products of the barn, field and home, the Fair judged Iowa's humanity. Counties sent their candidates for healthiest boy and girl, and parents from all over the State vied with each other for the healthiest baby. When the infants had been run through the medical mill like cars in straight-line production, a solemn-eyed tot named Jimmy Miller Huntley of Ames emerged as the grand champion sweepstakes winner with a health score of 99.1%.

When it comes to a painting, Iowa gets right down to fundamentals. It divides all pictorial art into two simple classes: "Conservative" which looks like what it is supposed to be and "Modernist," which does not. Last year the "Conservatives" were indignant when a "Modernist" won the Art Salon sweepstakes prize. This year they managed to elect a judge of their own choosing, Landscapist Frederic Tellander of Chicago. Great was their chagrin when Judge Tellander looked over the lot, selected River Bend by Marvin Cone, art instructor at Coe College, Cedar Rapids. Good friend of famed Grant Wood, Artist Cone showed that eminent Iowan's stylistic influence. River Bend was a sweep of stream and a bent road over a round hill nibbled at the bottom by a quarry, all huddled under a low sky of close-flapping clouds. On Manhattan's 57th Street it would have delighted dilettantes. But Iowa "Conservatives" sent up a howl because the river was grey and did not look enough like water. Judge Tellander also gave a prize to a Country Gas Station by Harry D. Jones of Des Moines, which showed pumps leaning crazily on a steep hill. Secretary Alice McKee Gumming of the Iowa Art Guild damned this as a caricature. It was all most painful to Zenobia Ness, instructor in the home economics department of the State College at Ames and supervisor of the Fair's Art Salon. Tactfully taking no sides, she could not help admitting: "It certainly was a surprise."

Tent City. The carnival is not Iowan; the auto racers and rodeo folk are not Iowan; the best horseshoe pitcher is not Iowan; the livestock is not all Iowan. But the people who go to the Fair are Iowa itself, in all its friendliness, power, vulgarity and genius. And the place to see them best is in the Tent City, a unique colony pitched in a rolling, wooded 100-acre plot adjoining the Fair Grounds. These visitors, 10,000 strong, appear at the Fair year after year, are its backbone. They bring their own tents and by some informal right of domain have title to their permanent tent platforms. Oldest of the oldsters form the elite along Grand Avenue. Newcomers live back in the hills on the dirt roads. They gossip endlessly, help each other with the cooking, washing, children. They are resourceful, warmhearted, commonplace and they are Iowa.

Last week reporters singled out the doyenne of them all, Widow Agnes Kimer of St. Charles. Thirty-one years ago Mrs. Kimer went to her first Fair in a wagon. To her Grand Avenue tent she now goes in an automobile like the rest, but she is still sure that there is nothing like the Iowa State Fair. The nearest thing to it she ever saw was the Century of Progress two years ago. "It was fine." she admitted. "I thought it was as good as the State Fair."

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