SD Agricultural Education and FFA History

Student and Instructor Experience in the 1960s

By Clark W. Hanson
Professor Emeritus, Agricultural Education, SDSU

In 1963 Congress passed the Vocational Education Act, which revolutionized all vocational education. The author vividly recalls attending a District Agriculture teachers meeting and the new act was up for discussion, which included a comment from an experienced teacher (whom the author respected), which went something like, ”…we’ll never recover from this legislation, and we are going down the tube.”

The legislative bill, introduced by Representatives Wayne Morse and Carl Perkins, was the result of President Kennedy’s appointed advisory group’s report entitled “Changing World of Work.” President Johnson signed the bill into law. Grant funds were allocated for high school vocational education programs, high school graduates or dropouts, retraining, individuals with handicapped conditions, construction of schools, teacher training and curriculum development. The 1963 Act furthered the concept of vocational education and expanded previously passed vocational education legislation including the Smith-Hughes Act. Components of the 1963 Act will be featured in future articles.

The following are significant FFA events, which occurred during the 1960’s:

• 1964 - FFA sells one-millionth FFA jacket
  

• 1965 - New Farmers of America merged with the Future Farmers of America. The NFA had been established in 1935. The organization had been organized at Tuskegee, Alabama. The purpose was to provide educational opportunities for students enrolled in vocational agriculture classes at segregated high schools. The goals of the organization had been the same as the FFA. The NFA brought in 50,000 members to the National FFA organization. Convention delegates voted to increase FFA membership dues from 10 cents to 50 cents, allowing members to receive the official FFA magazine, The National Future Farmer.
  

• 1966 - First FFA National Agricultural Career Show held at National FFA Convention to highlight educational and career opportunities in agriculture. The Career Show continues to this day and serves a key role in encouraging FFA members to consider careers in agriculture.

• 1968 - President Richard Nixon attended National FFA Convention in Kansas City.
  

• 1969 - FFA opened membership to girls making it possible for females to hold office and participate in competitive events at regional and national levels. This was in response to Title IX requirements and long overdue. Ken Donavan was named the first National Star in Agribusiness and Washington Conference (now called the Washington Leadership Conference) began. The delegate body of the National FFA Convention established alumni as a class of membership for former members and friends of the FFA organization.

This article features two former students, Marvin Wastell and Jerry Johnson and one teacher, Richard Howard.

Marvin Wastell was a member of the Beresford FFA Chapter and Mr. Chicoine was Marvin’s vocational agriculture teacher. Instruction provided included shop, woodwork, crops and soils topics. Marvin was a contestant in public speaking, soils and crop judging contests. Marvin’s best high school memories were the facilities including the first agriculture classroom and a fairly small shop. During his junior and senior years in high school he recalls a separate building for the agriculture classroom and shop some distance from the rest of the school. Marvin’s farm projects included corn, soybeans, oats, pigs, sheep, ewes, ducks and milk cows.

He obtained his State Farmer Degree along with four of his classmates. He was named as the Star State Farmer in 1959. He was elected to serve as State FFA President for 1959-1960, went on to obtain his American Farmer Degree and was South Dakota’s candidate for a National FFA Office in 1962. At that time the South Dakota FFA Association was limited, by quota, to only three American Farmer recipients.

Marvin recalled participating in FFA Chapter sponsored activities featuring a Safety Program including farm machinery safety, FFA week, and constructed park benches for the community swimming pool. Marvin reflected on his FFA Chapter as being active.

Mr. Wastell currently lives in Omaha and owns Gro Master, Inc, a swine equipment company. Marvin was recently elected President of the South Dakota FFA Alumni Association.

Jerry Johnson started Baltic High School as a freshman in the fall of 1962 and graduated in the spring of 1966. He had Chester White hogs for his agriculture project. He recalls that his swine project was not the most profitable enterprise as hogs hit $.15 during that time. He had a secondary project consisting of Muscovy ducks. As the ducks approached maturity, Jerry took the ducks to Dell Rapids where they were cleaned for $1.00 per duck. Jerry’s best memory was his instructor whom he describes as fantastic. Mr. Jim Pollmann was strict but somewhat informal. Jerry indicated that he enjoyed the class tours with fellow classmates. Jerry’s greatly appreciated the farm visits Mr. Pollmann conducted.

A rather small room housed Jerry’s class consisting of twenty students. Class members were required to keep project records and were deemed important for a student at that point in life. Jerry particularly enjoyed drafting classes. He recalls, vividly, a shop class where the requirement was to build a bookcase, which he has to this day. Instruction in parliamentary procedure was deemed to be very important and the FFA Chapter was indeed viewed favorably by the school and community.

Jerry had heard from other students that the FFA would be an interesting experience. He fully intended to remain on the farm, but health reason prevented such employment. The FFA stands out as a great experience as he was a member of the milk quality and dairy cattle judging teams. Jerry recalls a lot of “back ground” preparation for participating in state contests.

Richard Howard started teaching Vocational Agriculture at Doland High School in 1966. Mr. Howard described his curriculum as the traditional Crop Production, freshman year; Livestock Production, sophomore year; Agricultural Mechanics, junior year and Farm Management, senior year. This particular curriculum design was considered somewhat standard at that time. The instructional pattern included Monday, Wednesday and Friday classes in the vocational agriculture classroom with Tuesdays and Thursday classes delivered in the shop.

All of the contests sponsored by the National FFA organization were replicated at the State level for South Dakota FFA members. Doland High School vocational agriculture students exhibited a high degree of interest to compete in State Contests. Richard stated that he found it interesting to teach students to detect various flavors in milk and what caused various objectionable flavors.

Students also exhibited a high level of enthusiasm for the FFA. During the same time period, the Doland High School students were serious participants in speech and declam. Sounds like a group of competitive students.

Mr. Howard remarked on the good classroom facilities including an excellent shop. He appreciated the support of the Superintendent who frequently had a “suggestion” for a “project” or two. This too was often a common item from school to school.

Mr. Howard is a retired South Dakota State University State Youth Extension Specialist.

Future articles will focus on developments in agricultural education and growth of the FFA organization in the 1970’s and beyond.