Oral History Project
See and hear the stories of earliest Ag Progress Days
I Remember Ag Progress Days: an Oral History Project, produced by the Friends of the Pasto Agricultural Museum, aims to ensure that the stories of the earliest Ag Progress Days event are captured, and that the memories of those involved not be lost. Interviews with volunteers, staff, and visitors will attempt to place the many facets of planning, organizing, and participating in such a large event in context so that their recollections can inform the past, enrich the present, and provide a glimpse of the future.
Larry Harpster
Remembering Parsons Farm
Larry Harpster remembers milking cows and his father helping with the plowing on the Parsons Farm, an active dairying operation until sold to Penn State for agricultural research.
Steve Spencer
This goes back quite a while...
Steve Spencer provides a timeline of the event from when it traveled across the commonwealth and before it was named "Ag Progress Days".
Al Jarrett
We'd need a four-lane highway...
Al Jarrett was asked as an young faculty in the 1970s to study the roadway access and parking needs of anticipated attendance to the growing event.
Bob Hazelton
History and Ham Radio
Bob Hazelton shares how ham radio was instrumental to ensuring the health and safety of exhibitors and visitors to the event, before we had cell phones and emergency 911 dispatch at the site.
Debra Gregory
Early memories of APD
Debra Gregory recalls visiting the event in Hershey Pennsylvania as a 4-H youth.
Glenn and Doris Carter
I need you to volunteer...
Glenn and Doris Carter recount the moment that Dr Jerry Pasto, founding curator of the Pasto Agricultural Museum recruited them as volunteers
Share your story
"The most wonderful part of the project—collecting interviews, editing video clips, and publishing stories—has been to see how each person has a unique perspective of the event we know as Ag Progress Days," says Rita Graef, Curator of the Museum. "Together, the collection of individual stories provides a rich and complex appreciation of this annual event."
If you have stories to share, do so via social media: #agprogressdays @pastoagmuseum, or email the Museum at pastoagmuseum@psu.edu.
