On Behalf of the Family Farm: Iowa Farm Women's Activism since 1945

Chapter One: This Rich Gift of Voluntary Leadership: Rural Women's Activism in Iowa

ChaPter One This Rich Gift of Voluntary Leadership Rural Women’s Activism in Iowa at the 1921 iOwa state fair, Sarah Elizabeth Richardson, a farm woman from Mahaska County, Iowa, made an appeal for the inclusion of women in the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation (ifBf). She asserted that “the Federation machine, great and glorious though it is, will never be able to function 100 percent efficiently until thewomen have climbed into the bandwagon .” In order to guarantee success for the entire organization, she urged ifBf leaders to “get the women, if you want to hold the men.” This speech prompted the organization’s male leaders to act, and in April 1922 the ifBf secretary, E. H. Cunningham, convened a group of eleven women to discuss how women might contribute to the organization on the state level. This meeting led to the creation of an interim Women’s Committee, which became permanent in 1923.1 In 1937, after serving fifteen years as the chairwoman of the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation’s Women’s Committee (ifBfwC), Richardson still eagerly promoted mutuality and the importance of women within the organization . That year she wrote that both men and women must be “interested and active” members so that the goal of “a happy, contented, prosperous family on every farm” might be achieved. Richardson concluded, “The women’s committee in state, county, and township and school district is not a division, but rather a commission to carry out the program.”2 Richardson’s insistence that women not only be involved but fully recognized as advocates for farm families is representative of the rhetoric developed by Midwestern farm women’s organizations during the first half of the twentieth century. Between the 1920s and 1950s the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation’s women’s committee expanded female membership, consolidated statewide control, and established a permanent, legitimate base for farm women’s activism. Organizing strategies that utilized social feminisms, identified outside threats to farming as a way of life, and justified activism as an extension of their duties at home mirrored similar efforts within otherorganizations , including the Iowa Farmers Union. Richardson’s careful selection of labels that placed value on women’s work did not necessarily con- 16 • ChaPter One vince male leaders and policy makers, but it empowered women to politicize everyday tasks and assert that their nonpartisan programs on membership, education, patriotism, and the home were an indispensable part of bettering the lives of all farm people. In keeping with Progressive-era clubwomen’s movements, they embarked on efforts to clearly define feminine issues and delineate separate female spaces in the ifBf. Education, refinement, and leisure were key components of defining female spaces, and even if prosperity proved elusive, structured meetings and organized leisure offered brief opportunities to engage in affluent behavior.The story of the Women’s Committee of the ifBf demonstrates how Iowa’s farm women adapted social feminisms to rural realities and laid the groundwork for a politics of dependence that emerged in rural women’s organizations after 1945. Founded in 1919, the ifBf consolidated existing county organizations under statewide leadership and became a social and political partner, as well as a financial contributor, with the government-sponsored extension service . This relationship generated plentiful resources and rampant misconceptions that allowed the Farm Bureau to build a membership base nearly ten times larger than the second largest organization in the state, the Iowa Farmers Union (ifU).This complex and interdependent relationship began in the early twentieth century, when the extension service relied on federal dollars as well as donations from local and private donors to carry out its activities . To ensure greater statewide consistency in extension activities, the Iowa General Assembly passed legislation in 1913 to create county farm aid associations, or farm bureaus, that would apply membership dues toward extension service agents’ salaries, office space, and educational materials. In 1924 Extension Director R. K. Bliss estimated that farm bureau memberships provided approximately $330,000 forextension service activities, more than three times the federal contribution. In some areas extension service agents and farm bureau leaders worked together so closely that many rural residents falsely believed that they needed to be farm bureau members in order to take advantage of extension service activities.3 If its connection to the extension service enhanced the ability of the ifBf to reach farm families so toodid its connection to the American Farm Bureau Federation (afBf), the national organization that provided oversight to the state affiliates and coordinated lobbying efforts...