It was a picturesque scene that captured the essence of a century of 4-H: Reuben and Lillian Ringer riding in an antique horse-drawn carriage around the Large Arena during the Pennsylvania Farm Show in January in Harrisburg. Selected from among 24 nominees, they were chosen to represent Pennsylvania’s senior 4-H alumni in several ceremonies during the show’s centennial 4-H celebration.

The Ringers joined Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture Sam Hayes in officially opening the 2002 Farm Show, and were guests of honor at a centennial banquet. The royal treatment was entirely fitting for two people who’ve seen more than 70 years of 4-H legacy in Pennsylvania.

The Ringers, of Schnecksville, Pennsylvania, were among the earliest members of Pennsylvania 4-H as two Lehigh County teenagers in the 1930s. Reuben became a 4-H’er in 1930. Lillian joined up in either 1931 or 1932, recruited by Lehigh County’s very first Penn State Cooperative Extension agent. They met and married through 4-H, were active in it as members and as leaders, and enrolled all four of their children in it.

“4-H has had a great effect on my life,” Reuben Ringer says. “I met a lot of people. I was on a 4-H potato team in 1933, and I raised baby beef in 1934. I was a leader of a 4-H baby beef club in the 1950s. Even in my business—farming—it helped me a great deal. I’ve continued to follow it and read about it.”

Lillian vividly remembers details of the day, almost three-quarters of a century ago, when a county agent came to the family farm to convince her father to let her join his fledgling 4-H pig club. “That was my first project,” Ringer says. “I remember exactly where the agent stood and where my father was. I remember the pig that I had, and I learned that pigs are not dirty, they are clean if you keep them in a clean pen and don’t have mud all around. I don’t remember the meetings at all. I was 10 years old, and that was 74 years ago. But I still remember forming the club, and I remember the friends that were in it.

“After that, Jane Creasey, a 4-H representative in Lehigh County, started the first home economics 4-H Club in Schnecksville, which was the village about a mile and a half away from our farm. I learned to make dresses. In fact, I think I made the dress I wore on the boardwalk in Atlantic City when Reuben and I were there on our honeymoon, so that meant a lot to me. We got married in 1940 and started a family. Of course, when our first child, Dennis, became old enough, he joined the 4-H club and the baby beef club.”

In fact, all four Ringer children joined a variety of 4-H clubs. Twins Linda and Elaine had to convince Dad that girls could do 4-H animal projects, too. “I remember going to beef club meetings with my brothers, and Linda and I really wanted to join that club,” says Elaine Waters, who now lives in Lansdale, Pennsylvania.

“When you’re growing up in rural America, you don’t have the social outlets that you do now, except for school. So this seemed like a really nice way to meet people, have some fun and learn something. So we bugged my parents for a while, and finally my father let us join the club—at my mother’s insistence. The first year I had a wonderful steer, and I won the reserve grand championship with that steer.

“The clubs helped you become more self-assured, a well-rounded individual,” she says. “I have a lot of fond memories with the baby beef club, and with the home ec club, too. We learned how to sew and how to cook.”

“4-H helped you make different friends and learn to be a better person,” says Linda Ringer Knoedler. “You become a secretary or other officer in 4-H, and you bring the things you learn there to your adult life. I’m an officer in four organizations now, and I know that’s a result of what I learned as a teenager in 4-H.”

Two of the four Ringer children went on to become adult 4-H leaders, and at least five of their ten grandchildren have been members. Reuben and Lillian are now actively lobbying the great-grandchildren to keep the 4-H legacy alive, and Lillian is very clear on why.

“The 4-H pledge inspired me,” she says. “We repeated it at every meeting when I belonged. That’s the sort of thing that inspired me, and I knew that it would lead them on the right paths of living in the future. 4-H enhanced their chances of a better living.”

—Gary Abdullah