The Grangers

   Grangers are the popular name of the Patrons of Husbandry, a secret organization of agriculturists founded in Washington, D. C., in 1867. Secrecy is confined rather more to the executive sessions than to any other business of the organization. The movement spread rapidly between 1872 and 1875, having in the latter year about 1,500,000 members. The Granger constitution forbids the organization's entrance into politics. One of the functions of the alliance, as conceived by its originator, was to assist in restoring kindly feeling between the North and the South; another was to protect and advance, by all legitimate means, the interests of American agriculturists. The Grangers were influential in the movement that resulted in the appointment of a secretary of agriculture as a cabinet officer and in the establishment of agricultural experiment stations.