Farm Bureau

The Young Leaders have their final pedal tractor pull of the season set for Monday, September 6 at Shannon’s Homecoming weekend. We will be at the fire station. Registration will start at 12:30 and the pull will begin at 1 p.m. We hope to see you there.

Being Monday September 6 is Labor Day, the Farm Bureau office and COUNTRY Financial office will be closed. We hope everyone enjoys their long weekend which unfortunately is the last fling of summer!

Did you know the first Labor Day in the United States was celebrated on September 5, 1882 in New York City? In the aftermath of the deaths of a number of workers at the hands of the U.S. military and U.S. Marshals during the 1894 Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland put reconciliation with Labor as a top political priority. Fearing further conflict, legislation making Labor Day a national holiday was rushed through Congress unanimously and signed into law a mere six days after the end of the strike.

One good thing about Labor Day is it is the start of football season. College football generally starts the week before and the NFL starts the Thursday following Labor Day. At my house that means not only does Tucker have practice 2 nights a week and a game on the weekend, we have all of Sunday and Monday night to watch football.

Starting this week and on and off for the next 6 weeks, I will have an Illinois Farm Bureau manager trainee with me here at the office. So if you call or stop in you may see a new face. Her name is Andrea Beatty and she is from Mendota. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Agricultural Studies from Iowa State University. We are always excited to have a trainee and show them what a day in the life of a manager looks like and introduce them to our county. I will be sure to have Andrea do a column so you can learn about her and her experiences.

In the time she is here, we will be sure to keep her quite busy. She will have the opportunity to attend a District Meeting, our Legislative Update, our annual audit, board meeting, and possibly cleaning up the basement and reorganizing all our supplies from the summer!

The 4C’s will be touring Rolling Hills Progress Center next Friday evening. This is their first event of the new year. Each month the group meets to take a tour, enjoy a speaker, or play games and be social. They are a group of couples and singles ages 55 plus who enjoy just getting together. If you would like more information on the group, give our office a call. They are always looking for new members and have some great programs planned for the upcoming year.