P. O. Davis

Posey Oliver ("P.O") Davis (1890–1973) was an American educator, administrator, agricultural editor, and broadcaster. He served as director of the Alabama Extension Service (now known as the Alabama Cooperative Extension System) for the longest term in the organization's history. ^[1] During the 1940s and 1950s, Davis became an advocate for farming and Cooperative Extension work.

P. O. Davis
Born	August 15, 1890 Skinhead Community, near Athens, Alabama
Died	1973 API, Auburn, Alabama
Education	B.S., Alabama Polytechnic Institute (now Auburn University)
Occupation(s)	Agricultural Editor Cooperative Extension Educator Administrator
Spouse	Mildred Kilburn
Parent(s)	Richard Scoggins and Milinda Elizabeth (Barker) Davis

Early life

Davis was born in Skinhead, a rural community near Athens, Alabama, on August 15, 1890, to Richard Scoggins Davis and Mildred Elizabeth Barker. In a family genealogy written before his death, Davis recalled Skinhead as the place where his family settled after being displaced from McMinn County, Tennessee during the Civil War.^[2]

After working as a public school teacher from 1909 to 1912, Davis enrolled at Alabama Polytechnic Institute (API, now Auburn University) in Auburn, Alabama, graduating in 1916. From 1916 to 1917, he worked as a horticulturist for the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station before taking a job as an agriculturist with Southern Railway.^[2] He also worked briefly as an assistant boys club agent.^[3]

In 1918, Davis married Mildred Kilburn of Florence, Alabama. He later worked briefly for Progressive Farmer before returning to Alabama Polytechnic Institute (API) in 1920, where he served as an agricultural editor for both the Alabama Agricultural Experiment Station and the Alabama Extension Service.^[2]

Work at Alabama Polytechnic Institute

In 1922, Birmingham News publisher Victor Hanson offered API $2,500 to establish a radio station to provide educational information to farmers and other audiences.^[4] Davis recalled to then-Auburn University president Ralph Brown Draughon that the donation was not enough to purchase broadcast equipment or operate the station daily. The Alabama Extension Director at the time, Luther Duncan, feared negative publicity if they refused the donation.

Davis, serving as the institution’s editor and publicist, was tasked with securing funding and personnel to operate WMAV, a station installed on the evening of February 22, 1923. The Extension Service ultimately spent significantly more than the initial $2,500 donation. Reflecting on the effort, Davis later recalled, “We pecked and struggled as best we could with the equipment, which was almost obsolete by the time it was installed.”^[5]

Davis worked with Alabama Extension agents throughout the state to organize radio listening sessions with farmers and their families. Extension Home Demonstration Agent Thalia Bell operates a radio at the Sandy Creek-East View Club, Tallapoosa County, Feb. 4, 1926.

After acquiring new equipment, Davis moved the facility to Comer Hall and acquired new call letters: WAPI. Davis also worked with agents to organize radio listening parties for audiences throughout the state.^[6]

After unsuccessful efforts to affiliate with a national network such as NBC or CBS, Davis relocated the station to Birmingham, where city officials agreed to cover approximately half of the station's annual operating costs, estimated at $20,000.^[4]

Davis also negotiated an arrangement with the University of Alabama and Alabama College at Montevallo (now University of Montevallo) to operate the station in partnership with API as a cost-cutting measure.^[7]

The arrangement with Birmingham and the other two institutions worked until the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, after which the city was forced to withdraw from the deal. This disruption in income forced Davis to lease the station.^[8]

WAPI provided the three institutions with a broadcast presence and ensured a "nice annual return on their investments" from about 1922 to 1961.^[9]

"Some day, I hope a competent historian will dig up all of the facts and write much more in detail than I have about WAPI — a comprehensive history," Davis stated in the Draughon letter. "I believe that it would be a story well worth writing and reading if done accurately and intelligently."^[5]

Publicist and executive secretary

While serving as WAPI general manager, Davis continued his duties as editor of the Extension Service and the Experiment Station. His work as an Extension agricultural editor served as a model for Extension programs in other states, which sought to reach farmers and other audiences through print and broadcast media. Many of Davis' staff worked with farm-related publications, agencies, and businesses.^[10]

Records show that in 1925, he traveled almost 14,000 miles by train and over 3,300 miles by car to conduct his work.^[11]

Colleagues of Davis recall that he often corrected grammatical errors in reports and other documents, even after he became Extension director.

Extension director

From 1933 to 1936, he also served Alabama Extension as executive secretary and registrar.^[12] After Luther Duncan was appointed API president in 1937, Davis replaced him as director of the Alabama Extension Service, becoming the longest tenured director in Alabama Extension history.^[10]

Davis was considered an idealist who was less politically motivated than Duncan. Some criticized Davis for not identifying closely enough with farmers, while others viewed him as an extrovert with communicative and organizational skills.^[10]

Davis's leadership during the Great Depression and through the war years allowed him to influence federal legislation throughout the Roosevelt years.

Davis was a public speaker, sharing his views on the future of agriculture and Extension's educational mission throughout the South and the nation.^[13]

Davis also expanded Alabama Extension's presence in print and broadcast media. He developed working relationships with Alabama newspapers and with farm home publications. Extension educational broadcasts were aired six days a week on most broadcast outlets in Alabama. In addition, Davis launched "This Month in Rural Alabama," an 8-page tabloid that ran as an insert in 97 Alabama weekly newspapers, with a publishing run of 100,000 weekly copies.^[14]

Views on industrialization

Davis was concerned by the farm surpluses associated with improved cotton farming methods, as well as the region's reliance on the crop.^[15] He advocated for farm diversification. "It is plain to me that cotton, upon which we are relying very largely for money income, must have help," wrote Davis in 1937. "It is also plain that livestock and poultry are cotton's best helpers."^[16]

P. O. Davis Drive, named in honor of Davis, on the Auburn University campus

A lifelong member of the US Democratic party who maintained a working relationship with the Roosevelt Administration, Davis feared the social and cultural effects of industrialization, reflected in the growing number of Americans who were working for employers. "So, individual freedom as our ancestor knew it is largely gone because one who works for another is not exactly free in the sense that one is who finances his business and works for himself," Davis stated late in his Extension career.

He believed that farmers, along with small storekeepers and small businessmen, were essential to preserving freedom in America, because they were "part capitalist and part worker."^[17] This Jeffersonian mindset accounts for his interest in and sympathy for the Farm Bureau concept, as Davis believed that Farm Bureaus would enable farmers to withstand the influence of big government and big business.^[18]

Clash with Jim Folsom

Gov. James E. "Big Jim" Folsom criticized Davis's goal of building up Extension to reach as many rural Alabamians as possible, maintaining that this focus often came at the expense of other agencies. As ex officio chairman of the API Board of Trustees, Folsom filed charges at a trustees meeting on February 21, 1947, claiming that Alabama agriculture had declined partly because of Davis' mismanagement of Extension. Folsom also alleged that Extension failed to cooperate with other state and federal farm agencies, controlled the Alabama Farm Bureau, and was too politically engaged. Davis was cleared by the trustees, who commended him for his work.^[19]

Retirement

In the 1940s, there was a dispute between Davis and Elbert H. Norton, state school superintendent, over the succession of Luther Duncan as API president, who had died in 1947.^{[20][relevant?]}

Davis retired in 1959 and was succeeded by E. T. York. He spent the last few years of his life compiling a genealogy of the Davis family and serving on several professional and charitable boards. He also served as president of the Alabama Writers Council from 1962-63.

Among his honors, Progressive Farmer magazine voted him "Man of the Year" in Agriculture, and the American Farm Bureau awarded him a medal and certificate in 1945. He was also listed in Who's Who in America for 1952-53.^[2]