Connecticut western news., 1906-09-27
UNCLE EZRA PERKINS
AT THE GREAT HARRINGTON FAIR

Bub Wins Premium Money-A Scheme
 for Increasing the Exhibits-lt Has
 Its Drawbacks, However-The Tired
 Farmers Conjunctive Farm Produce
 Department-csn't Spare the Patch.
 Pompoonick, September the %.
 Deer Mir. Editur:-I hev ben so bizzy of late a gittin' in rops that hain't had mutch time to rite to ennyboddy and I cackelate likely that perhaps you think I hain't ben so nayburly as I ought to ben so jest sot down to skrib- ble you few lines so you'll no we're all right and takin' our rashuns regler
 Bub he'd ben lookin' forerd to the fare fer sum sevrul weeks and a more ambishus youugster you never seen than him after me and Mirandy told him as how, bein' farm work is perty we'll along with us. he could take in all fore daze if he wanted to. He carried heap of stuff fer exhibishun and when we got hum last mite he fingered up the pree- miums he he'd winned and sei he hez got enuff mummy fer to have his pikters took, git new skunk trap, git sum new sullyloid kollers, go to one more sirkus, if enny more cums eround afore winter sets in, and have suthin' left fer the domonie's donashun.
 After we got to the grounds we tied the old mare to one of the ralins where 1t don't cost nothin' to hitch, put on her fly blanket, hid our lunch box in the horse blanket, put my pokkit book in my inside vest rokkit and started out to git our three shillin's worth ov site seein.
 Of course we looked over the agricul- ttiral exhibit becuz that's rite in our line O business. Mirandy concluded 'twuz perty good but told Bub he might jest as we'll won more premiums here if he had brought more stuff. I told her that that's what I've hearn lots of people say while lookin' at the fair but tellin' what they mite a done aint' no music in the ears of lot of fare dlrec- tors what is tryin' to git up q rip snortin' fare.
 Bub sez he bleevs the farm perduce exhibit is about as large at the fare now as it can be made under present condis-  huns and that he hez ben, as evry enter prism sittyzen ought to, givin' this sub iect considerable thawt and when the society gifts reddy to git out next yeer's premium list, he iz goin' to jot down a few suggestions and take 'em down to the committee. I asked him what he had i'll mind and he sed he want reddy to give away all hiz idees yet but wood tell me one or two.
 He bleevs in leevin' the present classes as they be. They are all rite, he sez, az fur as they go but they don't go fur enuff. He bleevs there shood be more classes so that there will be, all in all, classes enuff so that every farmer can have suthin' on his farm eligible to en- try for premium" as the list says. He calls his new skeem the Hired Far mers' Conjunctive Farm Perduce De- partment" and proposes it shell be this way: He notises that there hain't no premiums offered fer the best burdock. bull thissle, jill-grow over the. ground yaller dock, etc. He wood have exhibits ov all these but the premium wood de- pend on suthin' else besides. Each ex- patch which hez, up to fare time, ben located on the slack ov his pantaloons. The patch must have with it sworn affy- davit of the village storekeeper, or the proprietor of the grosery with a back room, that the exhibitor has acquired the necessity for the patch by bringin' his person in contact, for certain length of time, with the proprietor's chares which will show partially that the growth of the weed hain't ben interfered with by a hoe, harrow or any other cultivatin' tool which sum farmers bring into their lots, and that the exhilitor hain't ben tryin' to git tho bess of his naybur by sneekin' out into the lot and nursin the weed by squirtin' milk into it or doin' anyting else to make it git up and hump itself. The feller with the biggest patch, the biggest weed and the httlest crop of anything else on his farm, gifts the first premium. "I believe that wood draw big exhibit and frum sum sections DO of 'twould be bigger n the exhibit of regler farm crops"
 "Yes, 6ub," sez I, "but your skeem hez it's drawbacks.
 What be they?" sez Bub.
 Don't you see it will take labor to git out into that lot, git the weeds and git them to the fare and labor hain't in the category of this class of exhibitors?"
 "I've thought of that" sez Bub, "and one of the condishuns is that the fare society must come and git the weeds theirselves, take 'em to the fare and