Newspaper And Magazine Promotion
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Traditionally, 4-H history has not given nearly enough credit to the roles played by editors of newspapers and magazines in supporting and promoting rural boys and girls and the beginning of club work.
The first recorded prizes given for a corn contest back in the 1850s were given by a newspaper editor – Horace Greeley of the New York Tribune. The first national farm youth magazine – Junior Soldiers of the Soil – was published in January, 1919 by E. T. Meredith and Meredith Publishing Company. In 1921, Mr. Meredith became the chairman of the National Committee on Boys and Girls Club Work, later to become National 4-H Council.
Both farm editors of daily newspapers and farm magazine publishers of state and national publications were some of 4-H's strongest supporters starting back in the 1920s and even during the previous decade. Both the Newspaper Farm Editors Association and the American Agricultural Editors' Association had their annual meetings in Chicago at the same time as National 4-H Congress up at least into the 1970s. Most of them did features on the 4-H Congress winners throughout the week for their respective publications.
Over the years 4-H Extension, USDA gave a number of national 4-H citations to these publications including: Farm Journal, Hoard's Dairyman, Progressive Farmer, Successful Farming, Prairie Farmer, Agricultural Leaders Digest, Southern Planter, Weekly Star Farmer, Chicago Tribune, Meredith Publishing, Newspaper Farm Editors' Association, and National Association of Farm Magazine Editors.
Some of the editors and staff members of these publications were continuously promoting 4-H, like Romaine Smith, Young Folks Editor of The Progressive Farmer and Dick Orr, Rural Affairs Editor, Chicago Tribune.
Others grew up with 4-H and were honored and recognized as National 4-H Alumni winners: William D. Knox, editor, Hoard's Dairyman; Alexander Nunn, executive editor, The Progressive Farmer; C. L. "Cap" Mast, editor, Agricultural Leaders Digest; Harold Joiner, farm editor, The Atlanta Journal; Sallie Hill, editor of home department, The Progressive Farmer; and John Vogel, editor, Pennsylvania Farmer.
While the agricultural press was always in close partnership with 4-H and gave much coverage to 4-H winners and 4-H events, other publications often provided 4-H features on a variety of subjects. A few of these include: Readers Digest, Seventeen, National Geographic, Family Circle, Jet, U.S. News and World Report, Time, Woman's Day, Co-Ed, TV Guide, Sunset Magazine, Scholastic, USA Today, Better Homes and Gardens, PTA Today, People Magazine, Changing Times, McCall's, Parade, Redbook, The Wall Street Journal, Money, Christian Science Monitor, and Ford Almanac.
One continual factor that perhaps the Communications staffs at National 4-H Council and both of its predecessor organizations can be faulted for is the way they did "reporting of success" prior to the 1980's. Annual reports and other publications would list the compiled stats – the number of releases distributed, the number of interviews, the number of media outlets reached, the number of column inches published... What impact did this visibility have? What change did it bring about? These questions never seemed to be asked... or, answered. To be fair, this was the way that the 4-H programs were also be measured – number of youth enrolled, number of trips, number of medals or scholarships, volume of Supply Service sales, circulation of 4-H News... on and on. When the simple question, "What difference are we making?" was asked, most of Extension had to change... including Council. Statistics just weren't enough.
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