Putting Culture Back into Agriculture

Detail of Lois Ireland's "Harvest Time," featured on the cover of "Rural Artists of Wisconsin" by John Rector Barton, 1948. Photo courtesy Northern Lakes Center for the Arts

Editor's note: This is a grant report from Wisconsin – a great one. We present it here not only because we think it is a lively and creative working model grant report to a funder, but also because the grant project itself has a unique design and the report imparts some valuable insights into the collaboration of artists and farmers that should be widely shared. It was delivered to University of Wisconsin-Extension, reporting on the process and outcomes of a 2006 cross-divisional grant to the UW Department of Liberal Studies and the Arts (Miranda McClenaghan, project leader; Maryo Gard Ewell, project coordinator). Ewell has placed the project in the context of UW-Extension's long history of blending agricultural/educational outreach with the arts. She has also translated the events of the four projects into "outcomes," mining them for cultural meaning.

Context: Voices From Extension's Rich History

The arts were part of the Wisconsin Idea almost as soon as the term was coined. President Charles Van Hise said:

I would have no mute, inglorious Milton in this state…I would have everybody who has a talent have an opportunity to find his way so far as his talent will carry him, and that is only possible through university extension supplementing the schools and colleges.[1]

A little later, in 1912, playwright Percy MacKaye wrote about the Wisconsin Idea. He said:

The Wisconsin Idea involves the full scope of popular self-government; but popular self-government without indigenous art forms is incapable of civilized expression.[2]

Still later, in 1925, President Glenn Frank said:

There’s a gap somewhere in the soul of the people that troops into the theater but never produces a folk drama…. The arts are vital, if in the years ahead we are to master instead of being mastered by the vast complex and swiftly moving technical civilization born of science and the machine….[3]

Within the framework of the Wisconsin Idea, the University of Wisconsin was a leader in “bringing the arts to the people” across the state. The Wisconsin Dramatic Association had grown out of the English Department and encouraged the writing and production of new plays. The Music Department spawned Prof. Edgar “Pop” Gordon who crisscrossed Wisconsin by train, urging communities to sing together. Vernon County conceived the idea of the home talent play in 1925 and with the help of the Agricultural Extension Service there was a statewide festival of dance, drama and music in 1925 that grew and grew over the decades as other counties designed something similar. The Bureau of Dramatic Activities loaned scripts and offered help in playwriting, acting, and producing plays. The Speech Department worked with the Extension Service to provide judges for the rural plays.

UW Dean of Agriculture Chris Christensen, painted by Artist-in-Residence John Steuart Curry, mid-1940s  Photo courtesy UW-Madison Archive

Chris Christensen, dean of the University of Wisconsin College of Agriculture during the 1930s and 40s was a big thinker. He said:

I feel very definitely that education in our agricultural colleges must be broad and include many things beyond those methods and practices used in making money. Our educational process needs to deal with good literature, art, music, history – the cultural side of life – as well as the practical training for better farming. An understanding and appreciation of art, I believe, is an important phase of an enriched cultural development among rural people.[4]

When Dean Chris hired John Rector Barton to chair the Department of Rural Sociology, he asked Barton to investigate and apply the ideas of the Danish Folk School to the College of Agriculture. Barton believed that

...any genuine indigenous art development is fed by people who live at the grass roots, who do the work of the world.[5]

As a result, painter John Steuart Curry was hired as the nation's first visual artist-in-residence, with a job description of helping anyone on the farm – farmer, farm wife, farm youth – to paint. Curry looked around him and saw art in the hills, the farms, the farmers, the animals, the earth of Wisconsin, and he believed that everyone has the ability to paint what was most alive to him – that it was just a matter of enabling people to do so. He emphasized personal vision over technique. As a result, paintings by farmers who worked with Curry are dramatic, breathtakingly alive. Curry said:

If you feel the significance of the life, the design builds itself. The feeling inherent in the life of the world cannot be ignored or trifled with for the sake of theory.[6]

The Wisconsin Regional Art Association grew, ultimately, from Curry's work.

In 1945, Robert E. Gard was hired in the Department of Speech, although he soon moved into Agriculture. At first, his work largely centered on helping small-town folk write and produce their Centennial plays, but his idea grew bigger than that. He saw no reason why every Wisconsin person should not write, just as Curry believed that everyone could paint. They both believed that it was the University's role to remove the rules and the pettiness of “doing art correctly,” and that if that happened

...there would be such a rising of creative expression as is yet unheard of in Wisconsin and it would really all be a part of the kind of theater we had had these past three days [in a writing workshop], for the whole expression would be of and about ourselves.[7]

Robert Gard, playwright, talking to a farm family about creative writing, early 1950s. Photo courtesy UW-Madison Archives

Gard's Wisconsin Idea Theater inspired people throughout the state. The “Theater” was not a place; rather, it was a vision – a vision of Wisconsin's “uprising of creative expression.” Gard and his Idea Theater sponsored touring shows based on Wisconsin history and lore to county fairs, produced a summer theater program at Camp Randall Football Field in Madison, wrote the pageant of the nations for the Milwaukee Folk Fair, founded the Wisconsin Regional Writers Association, taught writing in the Short Course, founded the Rhinelander School of the Arts, founded the original Wisconsin Arts Council, and constantly, always, encouraged community theaters and writers and later arts councils and arts centers statewide. Eventually, his Office of Community Arts Development within the College of Agriculture received the first local arts-development award ever given by the National Endowment for the Arts (1966-69), designed to stimulate indigenous arts in five rural Wisconsin communities.

By 1973, there were 28 artists in Extension with mandates to do this kind of work in all of the arts: to assist community and liturgical dance programs, to work with high-school bands or rock-'n'-roll bands or the state's Youth Symphony or organists in rural churches or Norwegian Folk Fiddlers or African drummers; to help strengthen community theater and 4-H drama; to support the work of the Rural Art Program; to support the Regional Writers Program, and more. They followed Van Hise's dream, that there should never be a “mute, inglorious Milton” in Wisconsin, but that everyone with a talent should have access to the University of Wisconsin to develop that talent.

Fast forward to 2006.

Putting Culture Back Into Agriculture: Initial Ideas

As arts groups throughout the United States have professionalized, they have also specialized. Rural arts groups have tended to emulate urban arts groups, and management books have suggested that nothing but scale distinguishes urban and rural arts groups. More and more, we are realizing that this is not the case.

Still, initially, we fell into this very trap. Our original proposal was for a statewide conference [about culture and agriculture]. Regardless of who might be on panels, the very idea implied that we – the conference organizers – had ideas that were “true,” for we would be setting the agenda. When we were not fully funded, we first scaled the idea back, and thought, perhaps we can do four or five small gatherings in different parts of Wisconsin, using the same basic agenda, shortening the program, and marketing each to a regional audience.

Then we realized that this approach was not consistent with the vision of the Wisconsin Idea artists. We needed to let rural vision lead, with our role to be offering support as requested. We would need to find another way of stimulating ideas about culture/agriculture. One of the management team said, What if...

• we reviewed a list of groups in Wisconsin in small places who have a creative perspective of agricultural activity. We'd seek this list from the Wisconsin Arts Board, from Arts Wisconsin, from the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters, from Extension agents and agricultural organizations;
• and from the list we selected four or five groups and contacted them;
• and we said to them, “If we gave you a title of 'Putting Culture Back Into Agriculture,' invited a creative proposal in response to that title, required that you work in partnership to fulfill the Cross-Divisional requirements, and said that your deadline is June 30, what would you do?”
• and then used these projects as case studies that we could observe to address questions we had articulated...

...what would happen?

With approval from the Cross-Divisional project staff, that's what we did. We ultimately invited ideas from:

• the Wormfarm, in Reedsburg
• the Spring Green Area Arts Coalition, in Spring Green
• Agricultural Heritage & Resources, in Kewaunee
• the Northern Lakes Center for the Arts, in Amery

We got their ideas – far more exciting than a conference could have been! - and designed the questions that we would use as we observed them and as we read their reports.

The Four Projects: Descriptions

All of the projects demonstrated the interdependency of human and natural, of growing food and growing ideas. All four of them are continuing into the future. Each taught us something. Together they taught us much.

Some projects did exactly what they projected.. Others went further. [Their end-of-project narratives and other exhibits were attached to the report. –Ed.]

The Wormfarm, whose mission statement is “strengthening rural communities through sustainable agriculture and the arts,” is an organic farm, and its owners have a keen interest in the arts. There's an artist-in-residence program, and they inspire people to participate in workshops that make 12-foot-tall puppets for the Reedikulus Puppet Festival and Parade each year.

Initial Idea: Their response to the title “Putting Culture Back Into Agriculture” was to schedule a series of meals, serving food grown in Sauk County. There would be artists and farmers at each meal. There would be facilitated dialogue between the two groups, resulting in a brand or logo that would be used at agricultural events (farmers markets), on locally raised food, or on locally created art, for Wormfarm believes that the creative impulse of farmers and of artists is the same impulse. They would call their project, “Home Grown Culture.”

What actually happened: There were indeed meals serving meat, cheese, vegetables, beer and wine produced in Sauk County. “Home Grown Culture” drew about 30 people per gathering, drawn from an invitation list of farmers and artists. They heard about the Wisconsin Idea and the arts. While farmers and artists almost at once recognized their similarities, they also realized that they had bridges to cross before they could learn to understand one another, to trust one another. They talked about the opportunities they used to have for common experience, and cited WHA's “Let's Draw”[8] as an example. They coined the term “cultureshed” to mean “an area nourished by what is cultivated locally...fed by pools of human and natural history...the efforts of writers, artists, performers, scholars and chefs who contribute to a vital and diverse culture.” They listened to artists speak; they listened to farmers speak. John Kinsman from Family Farm Defenders spoke as well, and by the last meal they began to address the question, “What actions can we take now to contribute to a thriving rural culture?” The Sauk County Ag Extension agent and former CRD agent served on the committee and attended the meetings.

They ultimately decided/did several things.

• Wormfarm's Home Grown Culture entry in the Reedikulus Parade, Reedsburg, Wisconsin. Photo courtesy Donna Neuwirth, Wormfarm

  Conclusions included: 1) putting “agri” back into “culture” is perhaps more important than putting “culture” back into “agriculture”; 2) culture and agriculture are interdependent and this does not mean that “artists interpret farmers' lives;” nor does it mean “artists are marketers or political mouthpieces for farmers;” 3) more attention must be given to food – where it comes from, what it means; 4) this is a long-term thing; there cannot possibly be “deliverables” after four meetings.
• The Sauk County Dairy Breakfast tent organizer offered to display information about the Reedikulus Puppet Festival in their education tent on June 10. With this deceptively small first step, an agricultural group acknowledged artists' importance to them.
• Meeting dates were set to discuss next steps. Ideas to be discussed include: 1) A tour of Sauk County – complementing the Fall Art Tour – that features both vegetables and art at roadside stands; 2) a photo/oral history/writing project of farm kids that addresses “life and death and life”; 3) a project addressing “superstar farmers”: Can farmers ever become “superstars” as chefs, athletes, musicians have done? 4) infusing agricultural festivals with the arts; 5) a public marketing project that shows the similarities between farmers and artists; 6) a project with a theme of “the family economy”; 7) using the name “Home Grown Culture” to create a brand for both art and food.

Outcomes:

• A commitment to continue working together. The Phase II group has met three times since the end of the Cross-Divisional Project Period. They are addressing the seven ideas listed above.
• Awareness that farmers and artists have more in common than they thought. They are especially tackling the question of defensiveness – why have farmers and artists come to be seen as so polarized? What can be done about it?
• Possible artist-Extension partnerships in the future. However partnerships with 4H and CRD – which are more “holistic” by their very nature than is Agriculture – may represent the most fruitful partnerships.

The Spring Green Center for Creativity and Innovation is associated with the Spring Green Area Arts Coalition. Its purpose is to investigate ways that creativity can be increasingly infused into rural life.

Initial Idea: Recognizing that Sauk County residents – farmers and non-farmers alike – have a deep attachment to the beauty of the landscape and a desire to preserve it for the future, the Center for Creativity and Innovation (C4C) proposed “From Land Ethic to Land Aesthetic,” a two-year project. The Cross-Divisional Grant would assist with Phase 1. Recognizing the importance of Frank Lloyd Wright in Sauk County, they would research his – and others' – ideas about the way that landowners can incorporate aesthetic principles in home exterior, lawn, garden and farm. They planned to develop both a conference to discuss these findings and to design a brochure to be disseminated to all Sauk County landowners, informing them of the ideas, as well as tangible ways to put the ideas into practice. This idea was jointly developed between the president of C4C and a local dairy farmer.

What Actually Happened: The project is proceeding exactly on schedule. The research is in progress, led by resident Barbara Morford. GiGi LaBude of the Community Forestry Resource Center been retained to assist with the research and to help “bridge the gap” between so-called “environmentalists” and “practical landowners.” The conference date is set for April 27-8, 2007 and will be marketed throughout the Midwest. It will include issues of government and business and agriculture as well as aesthetics. Several fact-finding visits were conducted with farmers to establish what they want to hear and how they want to hear it. The brochure will be created and distributed throughout the County next spring.

Outcomes:

• A diverse group of some 14 people, many of whom have not previously met together, has made a commitment to working together on issues of rural aesthetics. They met on August 24 to start designing a work plan. Unexpected partners surfaced (for instance, staff of Extension's Lower Wisconsin River Basin Project ) as well as Future Farmers of America.
• C4C has recognized that “talking to the choir” will not move the County forward, and that the key is drawing together people of diverse perspectives.
• C4C has recognized the degree to which one man's beauty is another man's eyesore, that one man's “improvement” - for example, razing farms to make way for a condominium complex - is another man's nightmare. The project will constantly address ways of finding common ground.

Agricultural Heritage & Resources, located in Kewaunee, is committed to preserving agriculture's diverse heritage and promoting its future. It's on a property with a number of buildings, some of which lend themselves to exhibits and performances.

Initial Idea: Agricultural Heritage & Resources (AHR) had an “Old Irons” show tentatively planned. Its purpose was to exhibit iron agricultural implements and describe planting/harvesting techniques of the different ethnic groups of northeast Wisconsin. Working with Liberal Studies & Arts enabled AHR to expand the concept to include a photography exhibit of northeastern Wisconsin farms, to include a companion exhibit about home-making among the ethnic groups, to collect stories and to sponsor storytelling and cultural demonstrations by members of the Kewaunee Homemakers Extension Clubs.

What Actually Happened: This project happened exactly as planned with most of the activity taking place on May 6, 2006.

• Some 200 people from towns such as Green Bay, Denmark, Casco, Big Bend, Sheboygan, Elkhorn, Brussels, Algoma, Chilton, Two Rivers and others, attended.
• Some 25 volunteers actively participated – providing interpretation, storytelling and general assistance with the day.
• The photo exhibit included some 262 pieces in a show called “The Lonely Barn.” Photographs were submitted by the public in response to a notice in the newspaper.
• More than 240 stories were received on the theme of the exhibit in response to a notice in the newspaper.
• The Kewaunee Homemakers Extension, dressed in period costumes, reviewed the story submissions and used them, weaving people's stories into their demonstrations of the kitchens and culinary arts of the area's cultural groups.
• AHR members, working with the Extension agent, instructed people that various crops take from the soil as well as how to preserve soil to ensure a quality life in the future.
• Various individuals provided items made of iron, or small collections such as aprons made of feed sacks.

Outcomes:

• People recognized that although the many cultural groups of northeastern Wisconsin did things differently, that they all had a work ethic in common. This may have not been commonly understood before the event.
• Attendees differentiated the architecture and traditions of Belgian, Czechoslovakians, Germans and other immigrants to the area.
• Attendees saw that “art” was expressed culturally in the “ordinary things” - in the adornment of dresses, in doilies and rugs, in knitting. They saw that “art” and “culture” are interchangeable – who is to say that “art” does not include food? That “history” is not stories?
• AHR intends for this event to serve as the prototype for an annual spring festival, blending photography, farm implements, food, stories and cultural traditions.

Northern Lakes Center for the Arts is located in Amery, and is a flourishing arts center featured in the book, "100 Best Art Towns in America."

Initial Ideas: The Center wanted to influence the entire state of Wisconsin, not merely a single region. Therefore, they received a higher percentage of the Cross-Divisional funds than the others did. Some years ago, the University had given the Center 39 paintings on permanent loan. The paintings were done by farmers who had worked with John Steuart Curry. The Center's idea was to 1) scan, then matte and frame the 39 pieces, creating a traveling exhibit (the originals are too fragile); and 2) reproduce John Barton's 1948 book, "Rural Artists of Wisconsin," which highlights works by farmers and short biographies of the painters. 3) The images and the book would be marketed to schools and libraries throughout Wisconsin during 2006-7. 4) Proceeds from the book, after costs have been deducted, would go to the Robert E. Gard/Wisconsin Idea Foundation for further reprinting of historically important Wisconsin Idea/Arts literature. 5) The Polk County 4-H office committed to helping to market the exhibit and the book to 4-H offices statewide.

What Actually Happened: This project happened exactly as projected.

• The images were scanned, matted and framed.
• Crates were built for shipping them.
• Two exhibits took place prior to June 30 – one in Amery at the Northwest Wisconsin Local Arts Agencies conference, and the other in conjunction with a “Future of Farming” dialogue at UW-Stout, sponsored by the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters.
• Other exhibits have happened or are planned at: 1) the School of the Arts in Rhinelander in July, 2006; 2) the Center for Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education national conference in Madison in mid-August, 2006; 3) Wisconsin Regional Artists conference, September 30, 2006 (tentative); 4) Gallery of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters in February or March, 2007; 5) arts centers in Ladysmith and 6) Menominee, dates to be determined.
• The book was reproduced, with permission from the University of Wisconsin Press, and 500 copies printed. An order form was created, and the forms and books will be available with all of the exhibits.
• A letter is being mailed to all libraries and schools in Wisconsin, all Extension offices, and all arts centers, mentioning the availability of the exhibit and the book.

Outcomes:

• People in Wisconsin are learning about their rural artistic history. Although this rich history has been acknowledged in Somersian's book, "Distinguished Service: University of Wisconsin Faculty and Staff Helping to Build Organizations in the State," it is largely unknown by rural arts groups since the dissolution of the arts extension program in the 1980s.
• People who view the exhibit and who have looked at the book have been overwhelmed by the paintings of relatively untrained farmers. This certainly substantiates Curry's idea that if people paint what they know, if they paint the life they see, freed of artistic “rules,” they will find their own fresh creative style that conveys their vision.

Evaluation

The questions that we had articulated as the central questions for this project included:

• Can artists and agricultural groups find common ground? Do they have a common idea of “art?”
• Can County Extension offices be important in helping identify this common ground?
• If artists and farmers are to work together, what do we need to know?
• If they can discover commonality, what is possible in Wisconsin?

In addition to addressing these questions, we defined “success” as:

• In the short term, did an event take place or did discussions seem fruitful (as measured by the percentage of people in one discussion returning to the next)? Success, of course, would be “yes.”
• After June 30, will something continue to happen? Success, of course, would be “yes.”

Methodology:

• We invited four responses to the title, “Putting the Culture Back Into Agriculture.” This ensured that we were not superimposing our desired outcomes onto anyone else (as a conference might have done). In effect, this created four separate cases. Therefore, we used a case-study approach to addressing these questions.
• We hired an outside observer, Jerry Apps, to visit the events and make observations that would address these four questions. Apps is a well-known writer who grew up on a small Wisconsin farm and who has been an Extension agent. Therefore, he understood issues on “both sides of the aisle.” We asked that his report be personal and conversational, so that it could be as accessible as possible to people in many walks of life.
• We requested a program summary from each group in their own words, thus eliciting their own values.
• We elicited themes as a result of our own monitoring of projects, of reading Apps' work, and of our own reading of the program summaries.
• We intend to monitor the projects and contact them in summer, 2007, to determine their longer-range impact.

Communicating Results:

• This report will be provided to participants, the Wisconsin Arts Board, Arts Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters for their Future of Farming dialogues (their program theme during 2007) as well as to various departments within Liberal Studies & Arts and Extension. We will encourage these Extension networks to disseminate information about these projects and use them to stimulate other projects.
• Apps' report will be put on Portal Wisconsin.[9] Miranda McClenaghan has already met with Jennifer Smith of Portal Wisconsin to find out how the information should best be presented.
• Apps' report has been sent to the online magazine/online archives, Community Arts Network.
• Findings will be disseminated via Americans for the Arts' Rural & Small Communities Listserv and the states' Community Coordinators listserv.

What We Learned

• That rural arts activity is holistic, and effective rural arts activity recognizes this, draws in people from many walks of life, and is not simply a small-scale version of metropolitan arts programs. (However, we also suspect that what we learn from looking at rural arts activities is also true at the neighborhood level in urban areas for in both cases we are talking about neighbors expressing common life.)
• That there is no substitute for “doing.” We realized that designing a conference that we would take around the state was inappropriate to our intended audiences; that “doing and reflecting” works as effectively (probably more effectively) than “talking about;” and that the rural people who design their own approaches to “Putting The Culture Back Into Agriculture” reflect “rural genius” in a way that we never could. Their projects were fresh, exciting, compelling – and have provided results that will continue into 2007. We'd like to believe that a conference could have done these things, but....
• That although artists and farmers quickly recognize that they have much in common, they seem to have learned to distrust one another, and overcoming that distrust is a matter of time and continuing conversation and knowing one another as people, not as roles.
• That much depends upon the sensitivities of individuals. It's the person, not the job description, who is attracted to participating in these types of cross-disciplinary projects. In one county the 4-H agent was interested; in another she was not nearly as interested as was the leader of Future Farmers of America.

• We learned that “art” is indistinguishable from “culture,” and that this is a good thing and it resonates with people.

  That “art” is indistinguishable from “culture,” and that this is a good thing and it resonates with people. “Art” may conjure up the stage, galleries, appropriate audience behavior. Even the word can leave people out; where blending creativity with food, traditions, history, meals and conversation communicates and invites people in. Is a John Deere tractor “art?” Or a story about cooking, told by a woman from a Homemakers Club? Or beautifully presented food? Or a good band? Or chamber music? Does it matter what it's called? Is it not about the creative impulse, is it not about an attempt to express something alive, something important to one's life?
• That discussions of “culture” and “agriculture” can lead to an interesting, potentially exciting alliance between artists and farmers – with the common goal of creating a small-scale, beautiful, sustainable community and economy and a vibrant community life.

Apps' report includes other important observations:

• “The value of these four projects goes beyond the important question of the arts and agriculture. These four projects have demonstrated that people of vastly different backgrounds and motivations can work effectively together to tackle a problem.” He goes on to suggest that this is a “model for dealing with many community problems and challenges” going beyond either the arts or agriculture.
• An important aspect of these projects is that they are proactive – there is not a crisis-fueling discussions of land use, urban-rural relationships. He says: “Reasoned, in-depth discussion, over time, with an opportunity for people to get to know each other over a meal, usually results in more creative solutions that are broadly supported and thus more easily implemented.”

Apps lists several additional suggestions for anyone implementing such “culture-agriculture” programs in the future:

• Study the historical role the arts have played in that community, especially as they relate to the culture(s) of that community.
• Recognize that the conversations between artists and farmers can be a source of fun and delight and a creative act in and of themselves.
• Recognize that an exploration of “culture and agriculture” goes beyond artists and farmers. It is, in effect, about what makes a sustainable community, and therefore must include young people, business people, environmentalists, water experts and more.
• Understand that there is no “model,” but that a sense of that place and its people will guide the discussions.
• Understand that “sense of place” is what makes art meaningful, to which Derrick Gee of Spring Green adds that if you listen well to people who work with the land it's not hard to understand their sense of beauty.
• Recognize the long run; have patience.
• Continue to make use of the many resources of the UW and its campuses, and especially of Extension, in the development of these dialogues, to which Donna Neuwirth of Wormfarm adds that it's important to study other Cross-Divisional projects to help understand why Extension would be motivated to work with artists
• Recognize that the Wisconsin Idea is as important today as it was 100 years ago.

If we can take these things into account, there can indeed be “such a rising of creative expression as is yet unheard of in Wisconsin ...for whole expression would be of and about ourselves.”

Conclusion

Was the project a success, in the terms that we set for it in the beginning? Yes.

In all four cases, people did what they set out to do, in the short term – and more.

In all four cases (including two which were initially intended to conclude in spring 2006) work continues into 2007.

Stay tuned for our June 2007 report, to hear what happened.

Maryo Gard Ewell is a writer, consultant and contributing editor to the Community Arts Network.

“The Rural Arts of Wisconsin” may be ordered from Northern Lakes Center for the Arts.

NOTES

[1] Howe, Frederick, "Wisconsin: An Experiment in Democracy" (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1912, p. 142)

[2] Patten, Marjorie, "The Arts Workshop of Rural America: A Study of the Rural Arts Program of the Agricultural Extension Service" (Columbia University Press, 1937, p. 25)

[3] Gard, Robert E., "Grassroots Theater: A Search for Regional Arts in America" (University of Wisconsin Press, 1955, p. 95-96)

[4] Schmeckebier, Laurence, "John Steuart Curry's Pageant of America" (American Artists Group, 1943, p. 82)

[5] Barton, John Rector, "Rural Artists of Wisconsin" (University of Wisconsin Press, 1948, p. 7)

[6] Mathiak, Lucy, “Bringing Life to Canvas: John Steuart Curry and the Rural Art Program” in "The Art of Rural Wisconsin 1936-60 Exhibit Catalogue" (Department of Agricultural Journalism UW-Madison, 1985, p. 6)

[7] Gard p. 217

[8] Radio program during the days of the Rural Arts Program

[9] Jerry Apps' "The Arts and Agriculture: A Report of Four Projects" is downloadable from Portal Wisconsin at http:www.portalwisconsin.org/Jerry_Apps_report.pdf.

Original CAN/API publication: December 2006