I ONCE WAS A FFA BOY

Those of you who know me will never believe this story.  The Future Farmers of America is a national organization primarily consisting of high school students in grades 9 through 12 and enrolled in a vocational agriculture class while also taking the traditional classes like English, Science, Math  and other requirements for a high school diploma.  .

This story is about me in 1948, a sophomore at Frankford High School, one of 12 high schools in Greenbrier County, West Virginia at that time  — (two today)

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The school was so small that when 26 of us graduated in 1951, we were the largest class ever to graduate from that high school.  The school was so small that the only math classes were Algebra one and Geometry.  The electives were typing, home economics and study hall. The English teacher taught English to all four grades plus typing, the Social Studies teacher taught a Social Studies class for all four grades plus coaching all sports, the Principal taught the two Math classes , etc.

And now the story gets stranger. Vocational Agriculture students in schools nationwide were primarily students living on farms, often extremely large farms.  The key here was the fact that if you enrolled in a vocational agriculture class, it really became a 12 month class as you were required to have a project and your teacher would visit you sometimes as often as five times a year, after school, Saturdays and all through the summer.  Their visit was to check on your project and check on the records you were keeping on that project.

Some examples of projects might include a thousand baby chicks being raised to become broilers six months later and sold to a poultry processing factory,  two or three dairy or beef cows or maybe a vegetable garden with a large potato section.

So the plot thickens.

Frankford High decided to add vocational agriculture as a subject and to give students one more elective.  An instructor was employed and a facility to house this new program was acquired.  The facility consisted of two buildings (now adjoined as one) that had been barracks for German World War II prisoners housed near the famous Greenbrier Resort.  This elective, for which I knew nothing, seemed more interesting than , study hall, so I enrolled.   We had traditional classes with books to read and homework all centered on agriculture.  In one of the barracks, a basic shop was installed with a wood lathe and a few other machines.  I remembering making my Mother a small corner shelf for her salt and pepper collection.  Nearly 70 years later I still have the shelf.

We also learned what FFA was and all of its involvement.  Also, I still have my vo-ag record book and FFA manual.

 

 

Now the revelation that all of this story leads up to.  I lived on a 2 acres “farm” with one cow and a large garden.  In order to have the required project for vo-ag, we had a small shelter built and two pigs bought to raise.  My only farming experience came from working on a neighborhood farm helping an elderly man with his farm during the summer months.  Still  I was a proud vo-ag student with a pig for my project  and later helped my Father construct a small house and added chickens as another project. And I not only was a member of the Frankford FFA but in my senior year I was given the Chapter Star Farmer award, the highest honor a FFA boy can receive at the local level.

 

I entered  the regional FFA Public Speaking contest and placed second.  My vo-ag teacher was so disappointed because his wife was an English teacher and she had proofread it several times plus we had practiced the speech for many nights.  The problem was that after the speech, the judges got to ask questions;  Well my speech had been about farming and one judge said that if you had a hillside with lots of trees but you wanted to convert it to a field where you could raise corn,how would you proceed.   I said I would cut them all down, get rid of the stumps and plow all of it immediately.  My answer got me in trouble because the judge pointed out that a rain storm could wash it away.  I should have said that I would cut down a few at a time so that the hill would become a corn field but on a slower schedule.

So we have a story about a  country boy who lived on a two acre farm with two pigs and some chickens  ….but that is not all….this same boy went to college, majored in agriculture and taught vo-ag for seven years with about 75 students a year in his vo-ag classes, each student with more agriculture knowledge and experience than their teacher.   However this same teacher was the advisor  to a group of FFA boys that won regional, state and national honors….girls did not take vo-ag in those days and thus could not join the FFA. The final footnote to this unbelievable story was that these students so respected this vo-ag instructor that at their final meeting they presented him with his very own FFA jacket.