The Country Boy's Creed

I believe that the Country which God made is more beautiful than the City which man made; that life out-of-doors and in touch with the earth is the natural life of man. I believe that work is work wherever we find it, but that work with Nature is more inspiring than work with the most intricate machinery. I believe that the dignity of labor depends not on what you do, but on how you do it; that opportunity comes to a boy on the farm as often as to a boy in the city that life is larger and freer and happier on the farm than in the town, that my success depends not upon my location, but upon myself—not upon my dreams, but upon what I actually do, not upon luck, but upon pluck. I believe in working when you work and in playing when you play and in giving and demanding a square deal in every act of life.

Dedicated to the Boy’s Corn Clubs of Virginia by Edwin Osgood Grover