Repository: UIHistories Project: Dedication - Ag Building [PAGE 14]

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arable loss of fertility, delayed development and wasted opportunities. Such are some of the conditions that led the various agricultural organizations of the State to unite upon one common plan and concert of action, and effort, to secure that long delayed recognition for our College of agriculture that shall place it in a position to creditably represent Illinois as an educational institution and successfully carry out the plans and fulfil the hopes of its founders. In unity and numbers there is strength. The individual farmer acting alone and for himself counts for very little in shaping public affairs, but as a member of an organised body of intelligent and thinking" men, seeking only the best interests and welfare of all the people, and no private or personal gain, is in a position to exert a most powerful and salutary influence* The agitation of one man or of any number of men not working in harmony can avail little, but when united with one common object and purpose, and backed by numbers, by intelligence, by fixedness of purpose, and by standing* as men of affairs, the influence wielded is immense. Agriculture has never been accorded the position or received the recognition from our State government that its magnitude and importance entitles it. Our farmers have been slow to assert their rights or push their claims* Merit and justice have availed little or naught, against united and organised effort. The development of the past few months with reference to the powerful influences that can be exerted for the shaping and controlling of public policy by organisations, even of farmers— hayseeds if you like—is no less important than the objects already accomplished. The latent powers and possibilities of the people have been revealed and the feasibility of their employment demonstrated. Through the influence and by the assistance of the agricultural organisations, Illinois can today boast of one of the finest —best equipped and most thoroughly up-to-date agricultural colleges and experiment stations in the world, and if there is anything lacking to place them clearly in the lead they have only to make their wants known, for those organisations, that