THE EXHIBITION


Introduction
Biography
Botany
Horticulture
NY State College of Agriculture
Cornell University
Nature Study
Education of Women
Commission on Country Life
   1908 Roosevelt Letter
   Circular
   W. E. B. DuBois Letter
   1908 Country Life Commission
   Report
   Outlook Magazine
   1910 Taft Letter
   1909 Roosevelt Letter
   Country Life Movement
Hortorium
Photography
Writings
Travel

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COMMISSION ON COUNTRY LIFE

In 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt appointed a Commission on Country Life, with Bailey as its chair. Bailey described the country life movement as “the working out of the desire to make rural civilization as effective and satisfying as other civilization. ” The Commission held thirty public hearings throughout the country, circulated over half a million brief questionnaires, and held numerous other meetings. Its report, edited by Bailey, was printed in 1911 and republished in 1944. The Commission offered three recommendations: a nationalized extension service, which was formalized by the passage of the Smith-Lever Act in 1914; continuing fact-finding surveys, fostering the development of agricultural economics and rural sociology in universities and the federal government; and a campaign for rural progress. Numerous state conferences were held, and in 1919, the American Country Life Association was founded.

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