Individual Details

Census

Name: Marvin Mclain
Age in 1910: 3
Birth Year: abt 1907
Birthplace: Iowa
Home in 1910: Lincoln, Poweshiek, Iowa
Race: White
Gender: Male
Relation to Head of House: Son
Marital Status: Single
Father's name: William Mclain
Father's Birthplace: Illinois
Mother's name: Minnie L Mclain
Mother's Birthplace: Iowa
Neighbors: View others on page
Household Members:
Name Age
William Mclain 44
Minnie L Mclain 42
Mildred Mclain 12
Margie Mclain 11
Miriam Mclain 7
[9]
Marvin Mclain 3
Mayand Mclain 7
[7 10/12]
George Elich 26

Census

Name: Marvin Mc Lain
Age: 18
Birth Year: abt 1907
Birth Place: Iowa
Residence Date: 1 Jan 1925
Residence Place: Lincoln, Poweshiek, Iowa, USA
Race: White
Gender: Male
Relation to Head: Son
Marital Status: Single
Father: William Mc Lain
[William J Mc Lain]
Father Age: 58
Father Birth Year: abt 1867
Father Birth Place: Illinois
Mother: Minnie Brennman
[Minnie L Mc Lain]
Mother Age: 57
Mother Birth Year: abt 1868
Mother Birth Place: Iowa
Parents' Marriage Place: Iowa
Neighbors: View others on page
Household Members:
Name Age
William J Mc Lain 58
Minnie L Mc Lain 57
Merian Mc Lain 22
Marvin Mc Lain 18
Maynard Mc Lain 16
E L Mason 47

Census

Name: Marvin L Mclain
Birth Year: abt 1907
Gender: Male
Race: White
Birthplace: Iowa
Marital Status: Married
Relation to Head of House: Head
Home in 1930: Lincoln, Poweshiek, Iowa
Map of Home: View Map
Dwelling Number: 14
Family Number: 14
Home Owned or Rented: Rented
Radio Set: Yes
Lives on Farm: Yes
Age at First Marriage: 22
Attended School: No
Able to Read and Write: Yes
Father's Birthplace: Iowa
Mother's Birthplace: Iowa
Able to Speak English: Yes
Occupation: Farmer
Industry: General Farm
Class of Worker: Working on own account
Employment: Yes
Neighbors: View others on page
Household Members:
Name Age
Marvin L Mclain 23
Nina I Mclain 24
Richard L Mclain 0
[3/12]

Occupation

Served in the Eisenhower Administration as Assistant Secretary of Agriculture for Agricultural Stabilization from January 1956 to October 1960.

Occupation

Returned to the USDA to serve as the Administrator for the Packers and Stockyards Administration on May 16, 1972, a post he held until January 20, 1977.

Retirement

Returned to the USDA to serve as the Administrator for the Packers and Stockyards Administration on May 16, 1972, a post he held until January 20, 1977.

Interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH MARVIN MCLAIN

By his daughter-in-law, Mary McLain, in May 1987 when Marvin was 79 years old.

ABOUT HIS EARLY LIFE

I was born on a farm about six miles southeast of Brooklyn, Iowa on Oct. 1, 1906. We didn't go to hospitals in that day and age to have babies. The doctor came out to our house with a horse and buggy, as there weren't automobiles either.

My early life was very interesting because I had three older sisters and later a younger b rother, so there were five of us. We were taught early in life that we had chores to do. We didn't have to worry about having anything to do because each of us was assigned something to do and if we didn't do it . . . well, we didn't have any problem because we knew we should do it and we did. My sisters were Miriam, Mildred and Margery and my younger brother was Maynard. My father's name was William James McLain and mother's was Minnie Louise Breniman McLain.

We went to country school and didn't have any school buses in those days. Fortunately, I had a school about a mile each way from where I lived. It was unusual that they were that close. Actually one of them was about 3/4 of a mile. We had a choice of hwich one we wanted to attend. Before I got through eighth grade, I had gone to both of them because of the teacher situation and so forth.

Country schools were manned by just one teacher and sometimes we had as high as 20 students and as low as five. Of course, when you had 20 it was too many because you probably had children in each of the grades and the teacher had to be able to teach all the grades and when you had five that was too little because you could hardly figure out enough to do.

My country school life was real interesting because I had a lot of friends and I had a good home life. My fathers' farming operation was substantial. He had quite a little land and always kept a hired mand and when we were all young he kept an assistant for my mother. So though the house wasn't too large, it had a lot of bedrooms and when we were young and all at home, we occupied all the bedrooms.

HITCH UP HORSE AND BUGGY

When I was still in grade school, my sisters, who were a little older, were in high school and it was my job to hitch the horse to the buggy every morning so that they could drive to school. I had to get up about 6 a.m. every morning and feed the horse so they could be off to school by 7 a.m. And even in the winter when it was cold, I was the first one up to get the horses ready. They drove horse and buggy about 6 miles and it took over an hour and a half. When they came back at night it was lots of times dark and I would have to undo the things I had done in the morning - unhitch the horse and feed him.

MODEL T CAR

The first year I was in high school, I drove the horse and buggy to school. Then one morning out of the clear my dad said to me, "How would you like to have a Model T?" I was old enough then to drive it and I think it cost $500.00. Boy, was I proud of that Model T. Roads were not graveled and high off the ground and if it was muddy, we just put on chains and went anyway.

But really the highlight of my high school time was when I got that Model T. This led to a little romance because Nina Stone, a student in Brooklyn High School and the gal I started going with as a sophomore in high school, decided we ought to have side curtains on the windows of the car. I don't know why we wanted curtains but she decided we ought to have them, so I got some nice curtains on the sid windows of that Model T Coupe.

HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS

I was active in high school athletics. I was on a "point-a-minute" football team beating Victor 157 to 0. We classified ourselves as state champions - we were undefeated. I was also captain of the basketball team. I was elected president of the sophomore class. So I was very fortunate in high school I tried to make the best out of the opportunity to study. I was not valedictorian but second in my class when I graduated. Nina was valedictorian the year she graduated.

COLLEGE DAYS

My life up until I got out of high school was a very, very interesting life. Nina was one grade ahead of me and then her father thought he had enough money to send her one year to college, so she went to Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa. After one year of college, her fatherthen decided that she was the only one that had the opportunity at all out of their large family, so he decided it would be better if she went to work. My folks felt it was kind of necessary that each of we five children have a college education. So, when Nina finished her one year, she came back to Brooklyn and worked at the Brooklyn Chronicle newspaper, a weekly, as a reporter ad did a marvelous job.

And I went on to Iowa State University and spent four years graduating in Agriculture Engineering. I was fortunate in college in that I joined a very fine fraternity - Tau Kappa Epsilon. I was president of the fraternity my senior year. When I graduated I was honored by being selected to Alpha Zeta, an hororary fraternity, adn Cardinal Key which was quite an honor at thattime at Iowa State University.

MY ONE AND ONLY GAL

All this time, Nina and I steadily went together. Fact is, neither of us really dated anyone else, although occassionally because of necessity, I would take someone else to our fraternity house party dances if Nona couldn't come. But neither she nor I dated naybody else and we went together really eight years before we were married and had a wonderful courtship. She would take the train to Des Moines and them come on up to Ames on a little railroad. She would get a room for the weekend and then go back to Brooklyn late Sunday night.

My college life was just as interesting as my high school life and I was very fortuante to have parents that thought it was a good idea to get a college education and in later life I certianly found that out.

FARMING AND GOVERNMENT WORK

My dad started out with 347 acres. I started working in the Breckenridge Hardware store in Brooklyn after I graduated from college and that fall Nina and I were married which was in 1928. The Depression began and times were hard so I left the hardware store in 1930 and took over Dad's farm and then over the years adding land untikl it got up to 607 acres. Nina and I moved out on the farm in 1930 and I had a job in town as office manager of the Poweshiek County AAA (Agriculture Administrative Act). A hired man did teh main farming and I helped when I had time. In 1944 I left AAA and farmed full time until 1952. That year we held a farm sale after being asked to go to Washington, D. C. during President Dwight D. Eisenhower's term of office to be director of the W. S. Department of Agriculture's Grain Division. Later Eisenhower appointed me assistant secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture when Ezra Benson was Sectary of Ariculture. I and then post and them went to work for the American Farm Bureau's staff and served as the group's chief lobbyist in Washington.

In 1972 President Richard Nixon appointed me to head the U. S. Department of Agriculture's Packers and Stockyards Administration. I spent 24 years in government service in a real interesting time.

I finally retired in 1977 at age 71 to Temple Terrace, Florida. Nina and I were beginning to take more trips all over the world. Cancer struck her in 1979 and she passed away on the first Monday in November 1980.

WHAT WAS YOUR FATHER LIKE?

Dad was well educated. He went to what was then called Grinnell Academy and he was a very intelligent man. He was a great reader and was elected to the Iowa State Legislature in 1930, just ahead of the New Deal. Then Franklin Delano Roosevelt came in as president and everything went Democratic and he, along wiht all other Republicans, was moved out of the legislature.

He was a very intelligent person, as was my mother. She went to Grinnell College for a short time. The part I admore most about my motherwas her devotion to her children. They came first and in later years after we had Dick (born Dec. 29, 1929) and Muriel (born July 25, 1935), we traveled a lot and would go to meetings and Mother Mclain was always there to look after Muriel and Dick. She just loved to have them come. They really liked her because she always had cookies or something around. My parents, and really my whole family, were just a pretty happy bunch. We all worked hard and I think did as well as anyone could expect.

HARDWARE STORE DAYS

When we got married on Oct. 20, 1928, I initially planned on going with International harvester Company because I took Agricultural Engineering. My brother-in-lay, Robert Breckenridge, who ran Breckenridge hardware Store and also Breckenridge Harness shop, wanted very much for me to go in with him in partnership. We wanted vbery much to get married and Nina didn't care about leaving Brooklyn. So I took the job in the hardware store and we lived in the town of Brooklyn for about two years until the stock market crash of 1929. Then we come up to the time of the Depression when all the banks closed. The hardware business and any other business at that time did a credit business and, of course, when people went bankrupt, as they did by the score, they couldn't pay their bills.

I could see there wasn't going to be any future in this. My brother-in-law had not finished his college education because of his tenure in the military. So, I urged him to go back to school and finish because he was a very intelligent person. he ended up doing what I suggested and got his degree at Iowa State University, Ames, and ended up as a professor at Iowa State University in Mechanical Engineering. At that time, we told Robert's father, who had wanted us to continue at teh hardware store, that Robert was going to back to college and I was going to take over my dad's farm. So I did that in the spring of 1930 and that is where I started my step up in farm programs because when Roosevelt came in, we were at the bottom of the depression and he was the one that was going to do everything big overnight.

We had the Triple A and the NRA and a whole bunch of things that were later proven unconstitutional. But he had the attitude, this is when the banks all closed, that very stiff medicine was necessary when we starrted off on our agriculture programs - Triple A. The county extension ageng wanted me to help star that program in operation in the local county and that is how I got started on my career in government service.

TRIPLE A DAYS

I had a couple of hired men I was papying $5.00 a week and they did the farm work while I helped the county agent set up the farm program in our county. At that time we had dirt roads and we rode horseback on the dirt roads in the county to get to the farmers and make them understand what the program was all about. I can remember several country schools where we had the meetins at night where there was such a crowd they would sit in the window sills in order to find out about the program and sign up for it. I could see the need and something had to be done becuase people were going bankrupt. So, I took the roel of helping carry out these programs which later I was county chairman for 10 years.

When Eisenhower came to be president, I was asked to go to Washinton, D. C. and ended up as United States Assistant Secretary of Agriculture. But it all started because of the Great Depression and people today think they have a hard time. They just wouldn't believe what it was like back in that time - the 1930's.

SERVING ON THE COUNTRY SCHOOL BOARD

I served on the country school board all the time htat I was on the farm - about 25 years. I remember the first teacher I hired when I went out on the farm. We had three directors in the school district and they were operating with only two because one of them resigned. About the first Monday nightI was at the school board meeting, they selected me not only to the shcool board but as president of the shcool board. That next summer I had to hire the teacher for the school. Nina usd to laugh about this because the applicants would come while we were out in the dairy barn milking cows and i would have to get up from a cow and talk to the teacher to see if I was interested in hiring her. I remember the first on i hired I offered her $45 a month and then she had to find a place to stay because at that time they didn't have automobiles to drive so she had to spend $4 a week for a room. She spent half of what she was paid for board and room.

SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS OF WASHINGTON LIFE

Most famous one was when I had the privilege of sitting in meetings with President Eiserhower and later President Richard Nixon and later President Gerald Ford when he became president after Nixon resigned.

Our years in Washington were about as nice as anyone could ask for because I was in a pretty high spot in agriculture and we were invited to the White House for various functions.

Normally when an ambassador would come to Washinton they would set up a luncheon for him. Of course, I didn't get invited to all of these, but once in awhile I would be invited to attend. Then Nina and I were invited to the White House in the evening on several occasions. One of the nicest of these was when England's Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip came over and they had a reception at the British Embassy to which Nina and I were invited. They put up a mammouth tent outside the embassy building because of the large number of people they had invited. We got to shake the hands of the Queen and the Prince.

The cabinet meetings were another interesting thing because President Eisenhower held regular cabinet meetings. Because of his military background, he was very much interested in running the show on the basis of giving orders. That was the way he worked - not try to do everything himself. Of course, I didn't do anything at the cabinet meeting unless it was in the area of agriculture which was my field. But you observed what was said from the other cabinet posts. The cabinet room had a big oval table and the President sat on one side with the Vice President beside him. This was all very intriguing to me - a country boy!

But the opportunities we had to go to these kinds of things. In fact, sometimes there were so many that we had to turn some of them down. But we never turned down invitations to the White House.

Another nice memory of my time there was that the President at Christmans time would always give us a little token of our official rank in the government and I had many of those - pictures of the White House Blue room. Eisenhower was an amateur artist and did a lot of paintings and the government would make reproductions of those for Christmans greetings. Some of those I still have anging on the wall of my apartment and I am very proud of them.

I was also given many pictures of the president taken at various years with members of his cabinet. We have lots of those around.

Now one of th areas that was vry interesting to me and started my world travels was when as my position in the Department of Agriculture, I was an official delegate to a international conference on wheat, cotton and sugar. We have international agreement with many of the countries of the world and most of those meeting were held in Geneva, Switzerland or in London, england because that was the internaitonal headquarters of the meeting groups. We would meet regularly and that was my first taste of foreign travel which I enjoyed very much.

In later years Nina and I went to many countries in the word. Both of us liked to travel and Nina was especially good at recording what we had seen. I would take the pictures and we would put on lots of shows with our slides whe we got back home.

Death

Declining health and dimentia after falling and breaking a hip.

Death

His obituary states that he died of complications from a hip fracture.

Burial

Birth: Oct. 1, 1906
Brooklyn
Poweshiek County
Iowa, USA Death: Feb. 23, 1997
Des Moines
Polk County
Iowa, USA
Marvin L. McLain earned a BS degree in 1928 from Iowa State College. He worked in the Commodity Credit Corporation and later swerved in the Eisenhower Administration as Assistant Secretary of Agriculture for Agricultural Stabilization from January 1956 to October 1960. McLain resigned his position in October 1960 because of what he called "an urgent request and excellent opportunity to serve farm people in another important capacity." He then assumed the position of Assistant legislative Director fo the Farm Bureau in Washington, DC on December 1, 1960. McLain returned to the USDA to serve as the Administrator for the Packers and Stockyards Administration on May 16, 1972, a post he held until January 20, 1977. At the time of his death, Marvin McLain was residing in Urbandale, Iowa.

Family links:
Spouse:
Nina I. McLain (1905 - 1980)
Burial:
Brooklyn Memorial Cemetery
Brooklyn
Poweshiek County
Iowa, USA
Plot: Block XVII lot 44
Created by: Harold Nevenhoven
Record added: Jul 25, 2011
Find A Grave Memorial# 73918355

Funeral

Memorial service