The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1918-12-12
FAMOUS AS RED
CROSS PIC CLUB
Cotton County in State of MisSiS-
sippi Converted Into General
Farming Section.
IS HARD FOR COUNTY AGENT
Hogs and Other Live Stock Now Max
ing Money for Farmers-During
Short Period of Two Years
Agriculture ReVoIutionized.

Carroll county's (Aiississippi) now
famous Red Cross Pig club sent to the
st. Louis market the other day "a cars
of hogs aggregating 1880 head. Ten
per cent of the net proceeds from the
sale were contributed to the Red Cross.
The best load of hogs in the consign-
ment consisted of Il head, averaging
$50 pounds, and sold for $40 hundred
weight. Other hogs, ranging from
shotes weighing So pounds to we'll
fattened porkers, averaging 279 pounds,
sold for SIS to S18.75 hundred weight.
This novel Mississippi method of
contributing to the Red Gross attracted
a great deal of attention at the Ma
tiOnal stock yards. Motion pictures of
the various phases of the marketing.
both in Carroll county and at the sale
in st. Louis, were taken by representa-
tiVeS of the United States department
of agriculture.
But the Red Cross Pig club is only
an incident in a rather remarkable ex-
per1ence of this southern county dur
ing the last two years. During that
short period its agriculture has been
entirely revOlutiOnized. The transfer
q
county agent in 1916.
Once Affection.
Carroll county, Mississippi, used to
be an all-cOtton county; it did not
grow enough corn, hay or meat to sup
ply its own needs. Farmers gener-
ally were in debt and the conditions
were as distressing as those in any
other section where cotton is king, and
where, since the advent of the boil
weevil, the inability to produce cotton
economically has made cotton farming
hazardous.
| In the fall Of 1915 0. F. Turner was
appointed county agent by the Missis-
sippi Agricultural college and the Unit
| ed States department of agriculture.
1t isn't an easy job to convert a cot
ton country into a general farming
section, but the situation in Carroll
county demanded an immediate an
swer. When the county agent talked
Investigation, farmers and business
men told him that there was no mar
ket for anything except cotton. This
Is a stock answer throughout the
South; Turner had to disprove it. He
answered it with stock. In December,
1916, he put on his first demonstration
| in the cooperative shipment of hogs, a
carload picked up from the farmers of
the county. He knew that if he demon
strated that there was money in other
things besides cotton, it would be easy
to put the county on a safe basis with
general food and feed crops and live
stock as well as a reasonable acreage
in cotton. The first demonstration was
a success. Prior to 1916 not a single
carload shipment of hogs, cattle. corn,
hay or other farm products, except
cotton, had been made from Carroll
county. The county agent pushed the
production of hogs and the growing
of crops on which TO raise the hogs,
and then he pushed cattle, corn, hay
and peanuts. From September, 1917.
to the first day of October, 1918, Car
roll county shipped 81 cars of hogs
lis cars of cattle, 155 cars of corn, SO
cars or hay, 20 cars of peas. % cars
OF Irish potatoes, 30 cars of mOlasSes
2 cars of peanuts, cars of sweet pOta-
toes and I car of sorghum seed, total
OF 472 carloads of live stock and farm
products other than cotton The ship
ments eliminated in the trainload OF
hogs from what is known as the Car
roll County Red Cross Pig club.
Pig Club Propaganda
Late In the winter of 1917 the cOun
ty agent took up with business men