Our History
Dallas County's Early History of Soil Conservation.
Although the Soil Conservation Service was born in 1935, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the soil conservation act into law, organized soil conservation did not come to the county until 1946, when Ivan Fredregill became the first District Conservationist for the government agency.
The Dallas County Soil Conservation District was organized May 10, 1946 by Fredregill and others who knew that the result would be a momentous disaster if the soil was not carefully guarded from the elements and man. Among the interested were three farmers, Ralph Mortimer of Dallas Center, Lloyd Mendenhall of Earlham and J. Max Gutshall of Van Meter. These three helped Fredregill organize the district by sitting on the first board of commissioners.
Although a few farmers were resistant to change, many responded enthusiastically to the new ideas. Area farmers and landowners first organized into 'groups'. These organized groups could then request the soil surveyor to survey and map their area so they could then develop a conservation plan for their individual farms.
Strip Cropping laid out in 1954 on the Robert Eakle Farm, Section 18 of Van Meter Township.
These groups would get together to discuss contouring, strip cropping, waterways, and terraces. They had demonstrations, tours, and speakers to help learn more about conservation practices. By October of 1947, there were eleven organized groups consisting of eighty-four farms, and five conservation plans completed. Each year the number of groups, individual farmers and completed conservation plans grew.
By October of 1951, when the groups were dissolved, thirty-two organized 'groups' were scattered throughout the county. The soil survey continued on an individual request basis until 1976 when a soil survey crew remapped all of Dallas County. Conservation planning continues today and will continue as farming equipment evolve, supply and demand of certain crops and livestock shift, and as the economy demands changes in future farming operations.
The people have changed, the organization has changed, the practices have changed, but our ideals remain the same--a rich and prosperous soil to be passed on from generation to generation which sustains the farm family and feeds the world and water that is clean and pure for both human and wildlife consumption, recreation and habitat.
Ivan Fredregill: Dallas County's 1st District Conservationist. Serving our county for nearly 20 years.
In 1946, Dallas County's Soil Conservation Service was organized, and Ivan Fredregill became the first District Conservationist for the government agency.
Fredregill's interest in conservation blossomed, not in college, but when he began working as an agriculture foreman in 1933 for the Civil Conservation Corps, which was part of FDR's work program. He received a degree in agricultural engineering in 1931 from Iowa State College (now Iowa State University) but "conservation was not talked about a great deal then".
From the forties to the sixties, conservationists encouraged contour farming, strip cropping, terracing and crop rotation. "Conservation," Fredregill said, "was pretty much like it is now, but it wasn't as sophisticated."
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