Madison County 4-H Country Ham Project

 Madison County 4-H is pleased to announce the Country Ham Auction this year was a major success! While we brought in more than $27,500 for the youth of our county, we also strengthened the community partnerships and instilled in the youth the importance of hard work! The youth involved in the country ham project are ages 5-18, and they cure two hams, give speeches at the county and state fairs, and call or visit local businesses to invite them to attend our country ham auction.

This year, we relied on our country ham committee to make rules for the project, as it had grown to surpass the capacity of our ham barn. Youth also gave a speech, demonstration, and/or a mock interview at our county communication contest in addition to normal ham club requirements. Due to this change, we had more participation in our communications project, and we sent 5 youth to the state communications contest! We had 4 youth place at state communications day! We also had four state fair speech winners from our ham club in our county!

After all of the work is done, students in enjoy a night to celebrate their hard work at the Madison County 4-H Country Ham Auction! Local Businesses and individuals came out and bought 26 youth hams for a total of $27,675! This money goes directly back to the youth who cured the ham! Two hams were donated back to be sold to benefit Madison County 4-H, and we received a total of $2000 between these hams! We could not reward our youth for this project in such a big way without the support of our community!