All through high school I wanted a blue, corduroy FFA jacket.
At the beginning of my senior year – the fall of 1964 – I finally got one.
That may not seem a big deal today, but at the time an FFA jacket was a costly garment – around $20, as I recall – and we simply didn’t have money for more than one coat. So, for the winter of 1965-65, that unlined blue jacket was my winter coat, fall jacket and spring jacket. Fortunately, I had sweaters for cold weather.
Each of my younger brothers enjoyed heavy white and purple letter jackets through much of high school, the fronts adorned with ample jingling sports and academic medals to shame a South American general. They came along just enough later than me to enjoy my folks’ slightly improved prosperity.
My jacket bore only my Greenhand, Chapter farmer and Chapter Reporter pins; but that was plenty. The gold FFA emblems front and back said it all. Unlike FFA members today, who typically sport their jackets only when in official dress, many of us wore our corduroy jackets to school every day. We were always in uniform.
It’s been almost 52 years since I last wore my FFA blue and gold, though I remained close to FFA during my years as a newspaper editor, attending banquets and other events. I got to know FFA members and advisors in schools throughout the area. As a former FFA member and officer, I’ve always felt the blue jacket left an indelible stain on my back. The author of many news reports citing the achievements of FFA members, I’ve come to regard young men and women in blue jackets as the cream of the crop.
My distance from FFA in retirement has not diminished that respect for FFA. Rather, I am persuaded the need for agriculture education and the leadership skills fostered by FFA is more important than ever.
When I was in school, vocational agriculture classes provided instruction mostly absent from other classrooms – business management, farm construction, genetics, nutrition, parliamentary procedure and much else. Sure, some high school classes touched briefly on these subjects, but none focused on the life skills taught in four years of vocational agriculture.
Further, FFA gave me my first exposure to other schools through contest competition and took me to both Kansas City and St. Louis – huge adventures for a country boy in the 1960s.
Today’s vocational agriculture students are more sophisticated than in my day. Moreover, they are on the forefront of new technologies and involved in more than the “plows and cows” of my era. Rather than farming, many are laying the foundations for future studies in all aspects of agriculture, from nutritional sciences to ecology and genomics to economics. They are stepping into a future rife with fields we’ve never even heard of.
FFA today is not the same as when I was a boy. It’s better. For one thing, about half of its members are girls.
We no longer call them “Future Farmers.” They’re so much more than that; but, they are the future.
Give me a kid who can lead his dairy team to national competition and I’ll show you a kid who can lead the world. Just put him or her in a blue jacket.
Copyright 2024, James E. Hamilton; email [email protected]. Read more of his works in Ozarks RFD 2010-2015, available online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or from the author.
