History of The Fresno Washington FFA :

From it’s founding in 1892, Washington Union, has always put an emphasis on preparing students for Agriculture based careers.  From the beginning the school was created in order to help the youth in the community of Easton to prepare for their futures, which for most was farming. 

As the school grew and diversified into other career paths for students, an agriculture career and activities organization was formed to cater to students interested in Agriculture known as the Junior Farm Bureau. The Farm Bureau was created sometime between 1900 and 1925 which included a county organization. The earliest record available comes from the Washington Union’s yearbook The Progress in 1925.

According to The 1925 Progress: “The object of the Easton Junior Farm Bureau is to increase the agricultural, educational and social advantages of boys in this district: (1) Conducting home and community projects.  (2) Holding monthly meetings.  (3)  Study of literature relative to our projects.  (4) Through entertainments and lectures.  (5) Giving and receiving information on demonstrations.  (6) Through exhibiting and taking part in county, district and state agricultural contests. (7) By learning to organize and cooperate with the Farm Bureau and others interested in the progress of Agriculture.”

 In 1925 the Farm Bureau had 25 members and each member was required to have a “home activity” which included projects such as hogs, bees, pigeons, and cotton.  The Farm Bureau held an evening meeting every month, along with school meetings on a bi-monthly basis. The students also stayed active in the summer by going on trips to the coast for about ten days. The Bureau also had officer positions with the earliest known ones being: President Teddy Poulsen, Vice President Archie Badertscher, Secretary and Treasurer Jake Leslie, Fresno County Junior Farm Bureau Representative Lee White, and News Reporter Craig Taylor.

In 1927, the Junior Farm Burreau expanded itself, not only by growing it’s enorllment to 52 members, but also by assuming leadership positions of the elementary school agricultural clubs.  The leaders and clubs were: William McElwain for West Park, Orville Shepard for Orange Center, Walter Lawsen for Oleander, William Shepard for Washington Colony, Bob Badertscher for American Colony, and Frederick Bissell for Manning Colony.  In 1928 the Bureau was awarded for the efforts in the elementary schools by the California Banker’s Association, who presented achievement pins to the volunteer leaders.

In 1928 The Future Farmers of America was formed by 33 boys from 18 states during the National Livestock Judging Contest in Kansas City and it’s goal was to provide leadership training for farm boys.  In the summer of 1930, The Junior Farm Bureau was replaced by Easton FFA when it received it’s charter from the National FFA headquarters becoming the 50th chapter in California.

The newly formed FFA chapter was active in activates such as hog breeding, May Day and FFA initiation.  The latter involved the creation of a team that conducted initiations for FFA Chapters at Fresno State, Riverdale, Fowler and Selma.  The Chapter’s first officers were: President William Pedersen, Vice President Edward Johansen, Kelly Arakawa Secretary, TreasurerThorwald Bisgaard, Sergeant of Arms Victor Oehlschlaeger, Reporters Aage Steffensen Armin Frankian and Sam Aprile, and Advisors S. Poulsen and L.R. Woodward.  Pederson and Johanson were Fresno County Delegates and Pederson was the Fresno County Vice President.

The Easton Chapter continued to grow during the 30s and were active in many fairs including the Fresno, South San Francisco  and State fairs were they showed Livestock, Horticulture, and Mechanics projects .  The chapter participated in several judging teams including: Dairy, Poultry, Trees, Farm Mechanics and Agronomy and also attended state conventions in Los Angeles and San Luis Obispo.