Editor's note.

Editor's Note: Dix Harper provides his perspective from his 50-plus years of marketing experience. Harper reflects on his role in the first Farm Progress Show and how the 50th show, held Sept. 23-25, would compare. Harper retired from WRAL/Capitol Radio as a farm broadcaster and is still very active in the National Association of Farm Broadcasters.

Dear Agri Marketing,

As the only living member of the original eight-man committee at Prairie Farmer/WLS that created the first Farm Progress Show, I enjoyed reading about the 50th show coming up near the site of our first one in October 1953. Although, your July/August cover is a bit misleading in that it has been 51 years ... not 50. The Farm Progress folks tell me this is the 50th show, however, because weather forced the cancellation of one year. I was in charge of programs and publicity that first year and held similar jobs for the second and third shows. Then, I went to the agency business and worked with International Harvester as an exhibitor.

At that first show, we had FFA teams competing in what was then called Land Judging. It sounds like that is back this year. Glad to see entertainment is also planned. Of course, in those early shows, we had all the WLS National Barn Dance talent featured on stage--Capt. Stubby and the Buccaneers, Loulla Bell and Scotty, Arkie, the Beaver Valley Sweethearts, Red Blanchard, Homer and Jethro, and Dolph Hewitt. Some things were not repeated after the 1953 show, such as the old fiddler's contest and square dancing on a tennis court in Danville at night. The first show ran just one day. After the third show in Cherry Valley, Ill., the shows went to three days.

Prior to joining WLS, I was chairman of the National Mechanical Corn Picking Contest, with state winners from all Corn Belt states. PF/WLS turned me down when invited to sponsor the contest in Illinois, because they wanted to sponsor in Wisconsin, Indiana and Michigan as well. Those states were already sponsored.

When the first meeting was held regarding the new show, I was told the idea was to come up with a better show than the Mechanical Corn Picking Contests. They were started in the late '40s to emphasize safe handling of pickers and reducing field losses from shelling and dropped ears. True, PF/WLS had been a sponsor of the old hand-husking contests, which ended with WWII. But the new Farm Progress Show was really a way for PF/WLS to outdo the mechanical contests.

As always, I enjoy reading Agri Marketing very much, and I also appreciated the feature on the 25th anniversary of Rhea & Kaiser. Great guys! And, I remember when they started very well.