Farming by the Book

As a boy on the poverty-stricken farm land of Chatham County, N.C., Clarence H. Poe got a proposition from his uncle. "If you'll pick the leftover cotton in that patch," he was told, "I'll give you a year's subscription to the Progressive Farmer." It did not seem much of an offer to a spirited, twelve-year-old North Carolina farm boy. The Progressive Farmer was a struggling, eight-page weekly with only about 5,000 readers. But it changed Poe's life. He got the subscription, and became so interested in the Farmer that, at 17, he joined the staff of the magazine as a writer. After five years, he and several friends bought the Progressive Farmer for $7,500, later turned it into a monthly.

Last week, in his 50th year of running the magazine, Editor and Chairman Poe's Progressive Farmer (circ. 1,227,329) carried more advertising than any other farm magazine in the U.S., and could justly say that its five regional editions "dominate the rural South."

Two Hands. Progressive Farmer dominates by giving farmers articles on everything from "Rhinitis in Hogs," "Bible Readings" and "Roughage for Dairy Cows" to "16 Ways to Beat the Feed Shortage" and "Poisons and Their Uses." Between pages and pages of four-color ads (beer and liquor are banned) are reader-participation contests, fiction, how-to-do-it articles, outspoken editorials and dozens of other features that fit within the magazine's editorial formula: "Stories [and articles] that are wholesome and inspiring without being goody-goody or pedantic."

To meet farmers on their home ground, each of Progressive Farmer's five editions concentrates on specific states, thus allows the magazine to pinpoint crop, land and cattle advice. When Poe first took over the magazine, farmers "believed more in the moon than they did in the agricultural colleges." Poe spurred the fight to change all that. Progressive Farmer educated farmers to diversify their farming ("Don't try to farm with one arm"), demanded "more doctors for rural areas," and worked for a better deal for the Negro ("We must fight for a much fairer deal for the Negro, even while we also oppose the extremist demands of his more violent spokesmen"). Poe kept Progressive Farmer free of any single farm group, still carries the legend in the magazine: "Serving no master, ruled by no faction, circumscribed by no selfish or narrow policy."

Safer & Sounder. From the magazine's headquarters in Birmingham, a 220-man staff keeps close tab on each region it covers, gets a steady stream of reports from its 35 part-time correspondents, and carefully sifts thousands of letters from readers who write to give or get information. (Samples: "I would like very much for you to tell me what colors of clothes would look good on me. I have black hair, brown eyes and olive skin," or "I would like a recipe for pumpkin cake for 100.") Board Chairman Poe, 72, watches his magazine as closely as on the day he bought it, still reads much of the copy, writes editorials, and likes to wave an article in an editor's face, asking: "Would you change one word of this if you were speaking to 1,000,000 farm people? Well, you are." Although he never went to high school, Poe has received honorary degrees from five universities and colleges, and in 1940 he was urged (but declined) to go after the Democratic nomination for governor of North Carolina.

Poe has built his magazine by more than skillful editing; Progressive Farming has swallowed up 14 other farm magazines. But it has not bought a competitor since 1930, when Poe took over the Southern Ruralist. (Right after the purchase, Progressive Farmer was pushed to the edge of bankruptcy by the Depression, but weathered the storm.) The magazine's editors now feel that "it is safer and sounder to increase [our] circulation . . . than to buy it from a competing publication." Editor Poe knows from experience that science and a changing attitude toward farming on the part of the farmers are all on the side of increased circulation. Says he proudly: "Farmers used to scoff at what they called 'book farming,' but now they're all with us."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.