Henry Groseclose. Who on earth is that?! FFA? Oh that farmer organization, right. How about this? FFA is an organization with 629,327 student members in grades 7-12. Groseclose started all of that. Henry Groseclose was the founder of an organization that still 90 years later helps members develop public speaking skills, conduct and participate in meetings, manage financial matters, strengthen problem-solving abilities and assume civic responsibilities. Needless to say, Henry Groseclose founded one of the most successful student-led organizations in America. Henry Groseclose was born May 17, 1892, in Ceres, Virginia, VA. In which he lived most of his life. Groseclose finished his junior college degree from Washington and Lee University in 1917. Later on, …show more content…
After college, he became an agriculture teacher at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute. Groseclose along with three other agriculture teachers, Walter Newman, Edmund Magill and Harry Sanders, decided to establish a club for the farm boys in the school. The organization was fired up in 1925. Groseclose named the organization the Future Farmers of Virginia, or FFV for short. The organization took off from there in two short years the organization developed into a national organization known as the Future Farmers of America. The by-laws drawn up by Henry Groseclose became the foundation of the newly national organization. Also, the formal ceremony that Groseclose developed was taken on by the FFA as a national ritual that is still used today. Groseclose came up with the levels of memberships; the Greenhand, the Virginia Farmer and the Virginia Planter. The Degrees of membership are still used today with slightly different names. While the official emblem of the National FFA Organization was being drawn, Groseclose’s original emblem, which he hand drew himself, was highly considered and ended up playing a part in