DATE:     12/3/97
CONTACT:  Dr. Bill DuBose, (803) 393-0484
          Russell Washington, (803) 393-0484
WRITER:   Tom Lollis, (803) 284-334

Russell Washington's Week is
More than a 40-Hour Commitment

     DARLINGTON -- A week's work for a Clemson Extension agent
doesn't stop at 40 hours. Just ask Russell Washington.
     He helps people -- mainly limited resource farmers -- set up
good financial records, both by computer and the old-fashioned
ledger.  He concentrates on Darlington, Lee, Kershaw, Sumter and
Williamsburg counties but has clients in nine other counties.
     It's not unusual for him to stop by a farmer's home at 5
p.m. to help get his records straight and stay until 10 or 11. 
He has been known to end a day at 1 a.m.
     "He's compassionate, patient and willing to answer calls on
Saturdays and Sundays. He's the epitome of what a county agent
should be, but I don't see how he keeps up that pace," said Bill
DuBose, cluster director for Darlington, Florence and
Williamsburg counties.
     Washington isn't about to change his habits, even though his
work was interrupted for awhile in 1991 by a heart attack and he
missed four months in 1996 because of an operation for
diverticulitis.
     His driving force is that he likes people and gets
satisfaction out of seeing them learn. A good example is Jeanne 
McMillen, who keeps books for her dairyman husband Richard.
     "She had a computer and printer, but wasn't getting much use
out of it. Then she came to one of my Quicken classes in 1995,"
Washington said. He helped set up the record-keeping program on
the McMillen's computer and taught her how to use it.
     "I have a better idea about how we're doing than I would
keeping records by hand," said Mrs. McMillen, who has now learned
how to set up accounts by herself.
     Washington has given the same help to Billy and Ann Hough of
the Kellytown community near Hartsville. They use QuickBooks, an
accounting program, because of a more complex financial
situation. His farm is separate from his wife's greenhouse
operation, called Pork Hill Farm.
     "Billy attended one of Russell's classes, and then decided I
needed to keep the books. I've called for help many times. He's
been a lifesaver," Mrs. Hough said.
     Washington has had his own lifesavers. One was his
grandfather, Cleveland Washington, who took in Russell and his
older brother when Russell was just 4 years old. That meant a
move from Myers Mill, which was consumed by the Savannah River
Plant construction in the early 1950s, to the Red Oak community
near Barnwell.
     "I learned everything I know (about life) from my
grandfather," Washington said. "Going to college was just a way 
to put it all together. He taught us to work hard. We plowed with
mules, picked cotton by hand and took a bath on Saturday night in
a tin tub. Those were some of the best times of my life."
     Washington graduated from Butler High School in Barnwell in
1963 and took a job with the highway department.
     "I thought they were going to let me drive a truck, but they
gave me a shovel instead," he recalls. That, along with the
constant encouragement of Melvin Campbell, his high school
agriculture teacher, was what he needed to decide to join his
friend and fellow Butler graduate Steve Odom at South Carolina
State. Odom is now cluster director for Laurens, Greenwood and
Newberry counties.
     Washington was the first in his family to attend college. 
They couldn't afford to send him, so he got a job in the school
cafeteria to help pay the way. He graduated from S.C. State in
1967, then taught agriculture for two years at Greeleyville
before being caught in the draft lottery.
     He was number 34 in the first group and went into the Army
in March 1970, not long after marrying his childhood sweetheart
Margaret Evans. He learned to work on everything from jeeps to
tanks and was on his way to Vietnam when he was reassigned to
Korea.
     "I worked in the motor pool for one day, and the colonel
needed someone to be a classified document custodian.  Since I 
had my college degree and knew how to type, I got the job," says
Washington. He spent eight years in military intelligence, but
left the Army with a rank of staff sergeant because he didn't
want his two boys, Russell Jr. and Marcus, to grow up as military
brats.
     Odom suggested Washington apply for a Clemson Extension 
position. He did, and wound up in Darlington in 1978.  He started
out splitting his time between 4-H and agriculture.  He became
the limited resources area agent in 1988 with an office in Lee
County. He transferred back to Darlington in 1991, and began
working as a member of Clemson's CUMAP team, helping FHA
borrowers on the verge of losing their farms.
     He works with small farmers in the Seeds of Hope Farmers
Markets in the Sumter area, encouraging them to plant different
vegetable crops, and to stagger plantings so they don't compete
with each other if two or more want to plant the same thing.  
     In Seeds of Hope, vegetables are sold in church parking lots
in Sumter by church members, with all the income going to the
farmer. When the farmers had trouble selling beans and peas in
the shell, Washington asked a Sumter County action committee for
limited resource farmers to buy a sheller, which eventually was
placed in a barn owned by retired small farmer Elijah Cook near
Dalzell in Sumter County.
     "He has a key and I have a key. One of us has to be there to 
use the sheller," Washington said.
     Washington was bitten by the computer bug when his office
got its first Radio Shack Model 12. Before he could afford a
computer at home he would often drive four miles to his office at
night just to try out a new idea. Now he has a laptop and three
desktop computers at home.
     One computer is set up for his wife, who does a lot of
church work. One is equipped with DOS, another with Windows 3.1
and another with Windows 95 so he can stay familiar with
whatever his clients are using. He has several different versions
of Quicken and QuickBooks on his office computer, since his
clients don't all use the same thing.
     Though he's comfortable with modern electronics, Washington
doesn't have a cell phone or a beeper. He explained, "When I see
somebody, I want to give them my undivided attention, not be
talking to somebody else."
                        END