I can think of at three reasons why I’m glad I was asked to come out here.
First, because I’m always grateful for a chance to get out into the country in the fall.
Second, because I like farmers and I like good, rich land and there’s a lot of both around here.
Third, because this gives me a chance to try to talk some of you into joining the Peace Corps.
Just before I left Washington, I was talking to Orville Freeman and he told me this is the first year since 1953 in which farm income had gone up instead of down. So this is a happy harvest time for most Americans a time of abundance and prosperity a time for us to stop and think about ways of sharing with others.
The Peace Corps is one way you can share with others.
Your knowledge of agriculture is needed -- needed desperately in many parts of the world. In South America, Asia and Africa, economic development is being retarded by lack of the farming know-how you have.
Already we have enrolled in the Peace Corps ten people from here in Minnesota and eighteen from across the border in Iowa. And, just to show you how important farmers are to our program, eleven of these twenty-eight are from the field of agriculture. Some of these Volunteers are still in training but next week Merlin Skredvedt from Gary, Minnesota, and George Askew from Millsboro, Iowa, will be at working the field helping the farmers of St. Lucia. Sue Bartholomew of Minneapolis and Dick Maze from Carroll, Iowa, who are in our Ghana project, have been teaching school in Africa for the past three weeks.
These Volunteers are not starry-eyed, impractical do-gooders. They’re good, solid, down-to-earth Americans who want to use, their skills to help the underdeveloped nations of the world. I have met and talked to them and, knowing them, I am proud to have them represent America abroad.
We want more people like them--people who want to give, people who are not afraid of a challenge, people with tough-hides and warm hearts.
I know there are people listening to me now who are the kind of people we want.
Some of you will have family obligations that prevent your joining the Peace Corps, but, for. those of you who can join and those of you who have relations or friends who can join, let me explain what service in the Peace Corps involves.
We are now enrolling Volunteers for two-year periods of service. We then send them to schools in this country--one of the schools we used this summer was Iowa State over at Ames. At these schools, the Volunteers are taught facts about the country they’re going to and the language spoken there. We also give them instruction in American history and government , and world affairs and whatever additional training they need in their skills.
Sometimes we get some surprises. For instance, at Iowa State this summer, we had farmers, nurses and school teachers in training. The school teachers and nurses went to the agriculture classes and darned if one of the ... girls didn’t make the best grades on all the agriculture tests!
This illustrates a point I would like to emphasize to you. Some people have talents they don’t know about. So if you have a friend who is interested in the Peace Corps but doesn’t ‘think he has any of the talents we want, tell him to take our test and let US be the judge of whether we can use him or not.
By the way, we’ll be giving another test in November. If you don’t see anything about it in the papers, just write me, Sargent Shriver, Peace Corps, Washington 25, DC and I’ll see that you are informed of the date and place near you where the test will be given.
While you’re in the Peace Corps, you’ll be paid a modest allowence, --- enough for you to rent clean living quarters and buy wholesome food but not enough for any luxury living. We’ll also put aside $75 a month for you back here, so that you won’t be flat broke when you come home.
A lot of folks have the idea that the Peace Corps is only for young people. This is not true. If you have the right qualifications and your health is good, you can be anything from 18 on up. In fact we have a married couple, who are 57 and 54. They rented their farm in Ohio, joined the Peace Corps and are now in the Philippines. That couple, by the way, not only has the right spirit, they have the right name too—Mr. and Mrs. John Kennedy of Oberlin, Ohio.
What kind of skills does the Peace Corps want? The list is long, but to name a few we want farmers, teachers, nurses, carpenters, bricklayers and mechanics. As farmers you’ll be interested to know that the need for mechanics springs largely from the need for skilled people maintain farm machinery, which in many underdeveloped countries becomes useless once it first breaks down simply because there are not enough trained mechanics to maintain it.
You may want to know just what kind of farming experience we want. Well the answer is any kind of farming experience that help these underdeveloped countries increase- the quantity and quality of their crops and farm animals.
You will be teaching people by doing. I can explain what I mean by telling you about three Japanese who came to India to help increase the rice crop. These Japanese talked to the Indians and told them how to quadruple their rice productions. But the Indians simply would not pay any attention to advice. Then the three Japanese rented a farm and put their advice into practice. When the Indians actually saw they could produce four times as much rice, they began to lineup to talk to the Japanese and the farm has averaged 38 visitors a day for the past year.
You know, I believe American farmers probably understand the basis of the Peace Corps better than anyone else. Rural life in this country has always been dependent on the spirit of helping your neighbor. Now that science has shrunk the globe, we are simply extending that principle to helping our needy neighbors throughout the world.
Our Volunteers go abroad to give that help ---- to make friends for themselves and for America – they go to learn so that, as they come back, we will have more and more people in this country who understand the problems of other nations.
Many will think the Peace Corps will fail. Of Course, the Communists hope we will fail. But even some friends of America wonder if we will succeed.
The Primer Minister of one Asian country asked me if I really thought Americans were tough enough to endure the hardships of life in the underdeveloped countries. He pointed out that Red China could send people who were highly disciplined and who had become accustomed to hardship through a lifetime of it.
I can now answer him for the people we have sent out thus far. They are tough. They are good, and they’re going of their own free will -- so at the present time we’re doing okay.
But what about the future? Do these first groups represent all the people in America who are willing to accept the challenge of the Peace Corps? Or will the people of this country continue, to respond month after month, and year after year? You and people like you all over America know the answer.
