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U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,
OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS,
A. C. TRUE, Director.
SOME FEATURES OF RECENT PROGRESS IN
AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
BY
xU C. TRUE,
Director of Office of Experiment Stations.
[Reprint from Annual Report of the Office of Experiment Stations for
the year ended June 30, 1902.]
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CONTENTS.
Graduate School of Agriculture
The science of agriculture
Educational values of courses in agriculture
College courses in agriculture
Aims and scope
Methods of instruction
Equipment
Description of departments
Agronomy
Animal husbandry .w
Dairy husbandry
Holticulture
Household science
Veterinary science
Courses offered
Agricultural course
Agronomy
Horticulture
Animal husbandry
Dairy husbandry
Thremmatology
Veterinary science
Secondary education in agriculture
Secondary agricultural education in Wisconsin
Agricultural courses in town high schools
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ILLUSTRATIONS.
Page.
Plate XLII. Agricultural education, College of Agriculture, University of
Illinois 438
XLIII. Fig. 1. — Agricultural education, new main building of the Mara-
thon County School of Agriculture and Domestic Economy.
Fig. 2. — Agricultural education, new main building of the
Dunn County School of Agriculture and Domestic Economy. . 450
IV
SOME FEATURES OF RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL
EDUCATION.
By A. C. True, Director of Office of Experiment Stations.
The past } r ear has been a notable one in the history of the move-
ment for definite education in the science and practice of agriculture
in the United States. Along almost all lines of agricultural education
there has been unusuall} 7 rapid progress; but especially in the differ-
entiation of different grades of instruction in agricultural branches
and in the organization of separate courses and institutions to meet
the needs of students of different ages and attainments has there been
remarkable activity. In this article an attempt has been made to
show some of the main features of this advancement and to illustrate
them by concrete examples of institutions successfully organized on a
new and progressive basis.
GRADUATE SCHOOL OF AGRICULTURE.
A new enterprise in agricultural education has been inaugurated by
the establishment of the Graduate School of Agriculture, which held
a four weeks’ session during the month of July, 1902, at the Ohio State
University, Columbus, Ohio. The plan for this school was originated
by Prof. Thomas F. Hunt, dean of the College of Agriculture and
Domestic Science of the Ohio State University, the purpose being to
establish a school for advanced students of agriculture at which lead-
ing teachers and investigators of the agricultural colleges and experi-
ment stations and this Department should present in some regular way
summaries of the recent progress of agricultural science, illustrate
improved methods of teaching agricultural subjects, and afford a some-
what extended opportunity for the discussion of live topics drawn from
the rapidly advancing science of agriculture. This idea received the
cordial approval of President Thompson, of the Ohio State University,
and on the recommendations of these two men the board of trustees of
the university voted to establish such a school and generously made
provision for the financial support of its first session.
The Association of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment
Stations at its convention in 1901 favored the plan for the school and
voted that if the success of the first session seemed to justify its con-
tinuance, it be made a cooperative enterprise under the control of the
S. Doc. 10T 27 417
418
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
association. The Secretary of Agriculture also expressed his cordial
approval of this movement, and on his advice the Director of the Office
of Experiment Stations consented to act as dean and other officers of
the Department of Agriculture to be members of its faculty. Under
these favorable auspices there was little difficulty in securing a strong
faculty. As actually organized this included 35 men, of whom 26 are
professors in agricultural colleges, T are leading officers of the Depart-
ment of Agriculture, and 2 are officers of the New York State Experi-
ment Station. Courses were offered in agronomy, zootechny, dairy-
ing, and breeding of plants and animals. The school was housed in
the substantial and well-equipped agricultural building of the Ohio
State University, where were illustrated the most improved apparatus
of instruction in soil physics, dairying, and other agricultural sub-
jects. Besides the live stock of the university farm, leading breeders
of Ohio furnished choice animals for the stock-judging exercises.
General problems of agricultural science and pedagogy were dis-
cussed at the inaugural exercises and at Saturda}^ morning conferences.
Among the topics thus treated were the history of agricultural educa-
tion and research in the United States; the organization of agricultural
education in colleges, secondary schools, nature-study courses, corre-
spondence courses, farmers’ institutes, and various forms of university
extension; what constitutes a science of agriculture; and methods and
value of cooperative experiments. Through social assemblies, visits
to typical Ohio farms, and much informal discussion whenever the
students met each other, the educational influences of the school were
greatly extended. Sevent}^-five students were in attendance. These
were drawn from 28 States and Territories, including such widely
separated regions as Maine, Oregon, California, New Mexico, and
Alabama. There was one student from Canada and one from Argen-
tina. There was also one woman, and the colored race was represented
by teachers from the Tuskegee Institute and the North Carolina Agri-
cultural College. Twenty-seven of the students are professors or
assistant professors of agriculture in agricultural colleges, 31 are
assistants in the agricultural colleges and experiment stations, 9 are
recent college graduates, and 8 are engaged in farming.
Considering the character of the faculty and students, it goes with-
out saying that the whole period of the session was occupied with the
most earnest and profitable work. Without doubt the influence of
this school will be felt throughout the country in the improvement of
courses of instruction in agriculture and the strengthening of the lines
and methods of investigation of agricultural subjects. In other ways
the school will exert a beneficial influence. So rapid has been the
accumulation of materials for a real science of agriculture during the
past few years that even professional students of agriculture have not
realized how large a mass of knowledge is already available for mold-
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
419
ing into a systematic body of truth which may be utilized for peda-
gogic purposes, as well as for inductions of scientific and practical
value. The summaries given by the experts gathered at this graduate
school have emphasized this fact and shown in a striking manner that
agricultural education and research may now be properly and effi-
ciently organized with reference to the science of agriculture itself
rather than be, as heretofore, very largely a matter of the sciences
related to agriculture. This will serve to stimulate greatly the move-
ment already begun for the reduction of materials of agricultural
science to “ pedagogic form” for use in colleges and secondary schools,
and for the reorganization of agricultural institutions of research on
the basis of the divisions and subdivisions of agriculture, instead of
physics, chemistry, botany, and other primary and secondary sciences.
The day will thus be hastened when the science of agriculture will
rank with such tertiary sciences as geology, geography, and medicine
as one of the great systems of knowledge of direct benefit to mankind.
The objects and aims of this school were explained by the dean in
an address at the inaugural exercises, from which the following para-
graphs are taken:
Our system of agricultural education and research, which vitally
affects the progress of our vast agricultural interests, has developed
very rapidly, its effective organization covering only about one-quarter
of a century. Especially within the last decade there has been a
remarkable development in the amount and variety of agricultural
research, in the methods of agricultural education, and in the financial
resources of the institutions for agricultural education and research.
This has led to rapid changes in the organization and work of these
institutions, and in the requirements of training and experience which
are considered essential to the success of agricultural teachers and
investigators. The demand for work on these teachers and investi-
gators has also rapidly increased in variety and amount. Under the
existing organization of our agricultural colleges and experiment sta-
tions the workers must very often be both teachers and investigators.
•Very few of our agricultural colleges are as yet able to do more
than give their students an undergraduate course in agricultural sub-
jects, and in a considerable number of those institutions even the
courses which lead to a bachelor’s degree are not yet raised to the
standard set by our older and stronger colleges. We are just passing
out of the era when boards of trustees considered that they had done
enough for agriculture as a part of the college curriculum by having on
the faculty one man whom they denominated a professor of agricul
ture. Considerable progress has of late been made in the division of
the general subject of agriculture into branches and specialties to be
taught by different members of college faculties, and a few of our
stronger universities and colleges have advanced sufficiently in this
420
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
direction to have established what in some real sense may be called an
agricultural facult} T . But it is still true that the opportunities for
thorough training in agricultural science, such as is given in other
sciences and in preparation for the old learned professions, are inade-
quate. If this school does nothing more than to illustrate in some
measure what ma} T be done in the differentiation of agricultural sub-
jects and the development of agricultural faculties for university
instruction in agriculture it will have served a useful purpose.
In considering the work of such a school as this it must be remem-
bered that the regular college course in agriculture, however well
planned and conducted, can do little more than give the student gen-
eral instruction in the principles of agriculture. It will not ordinarily
make him an expert in any one line. There is a need of higher instruc-
tion in the different branches of agricultural sciences in order that we
may have thoroughly trained agricultural specialists and experts. We
can not hope to attain and maintain leadership in the application of
science to agriculture without university instruction in agricultural
science. The agricultural schools and colleges ma} T give sufficient
training to fit men to succeed well as farmers, farm managers, teachers
of the general science of agriculture, and editors of agricultural jour-
nals. But the graduates of these institutions attempting to do high-
grade teaching or investigating must have some further means of secur-
ing the thorough and special training the } 7 require. One aim of this
graduate school is to provide a certain measure of this advanced and
special instruction and thereby to illustrate some of the lines along
which our universities need to establish advanced courses of instruc-
tion in agricultural specialties. The response which has been made to
the call for teachers and students to organize this school is a good
indication of the general widespread feeling among the men already
engaged in the work of instruction and research in agriculture in this
country that there is a real need for deeper and wider instruction in
agricultural science.
The need of a larger number of men and women well trained in
agricultural science and familiar with the most approved methods of
agricultural practice is keenly felt in various directions. Not only is
the present supply of competent workers in these lines inadequate to
meet the enlarged demand for professors and investigators in our agri-
cultural colleges, experiment stations, and departments of agriculture,
but the spread of agricultural instruction into secondary schools of
agriculture and into our public high schools is greatly hindered because
teachers trained in agricultural subjects are lacking.
The comparatively few men well trained for service in agricultural
institutions, farmers’ institutes, and, generally speaking, in the cause
of agricultural advancement on rational and scientific lines are badly
overworked at present. We must have more workers of the right
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
421
kind to swell the ranks of the vanguard of agricultural progress, and
it is hoped that this school will do something to find and train recruits
for this honorable service.
The cause of agricultural education and research is developing under
peculiar conditions. Popular interest in this matter is already so great
that demands are made upon the workers in our colleges and stations
far beyond their ability to meet. At the same time through their own
efforts, and those of workers in kindred institutions at home and
abroad, the materials for a true science of agriculture are accumulat-
ing faster than they are being reduced to a systematic form. While
it is true that within the past few } T ears there has been an unusual
amount of activity in book writing on subjects pertaining to agricul-
tural science and practice, yet there remain many agricultural sub-
jects on which there are no treatises that can be considered fairly up
to date. Moreover, books of reference, including dictionaries and
encyclopedias, have not kept up with the advance of knowledge along
agricultural lines, though within the past few years the makers of
such works have made hopeful progress in this direction. In man} r
lines of agricultural education and research the methods of instruction
and investigation have not been thoroughly proved, and the apparatus
and illustrative material needed in agricultural laboratories, schools,
and colleges are as yet ver} r inadequate.
This school may therefore serve a very useful purpose in bringing
to its students summaries of up-to-date information on various agri-
cultural subjects, and in pointing out ways in which the methods of
teaching and investigating agricultural subjects may be improved and
the apparatus and illustrative material for instruction and research in
these subjects may be increased in variety and effectiveness.
Like other great progressive movements of our day, the cause of
agricultural education and research needs systematic promotion in two
directions. Well-defined plans are needed for the development of our
institutions for agricultural education and research to meet the
enlarged demands of our people for information and training in these
lines. We do well, therefore, to bring the workers in our agricultural
institutions together to discuss the organization and development of
our s}"stem of agricultural education and research. But there is also
required a more thorough discussion of the methods of instruction
and research in agriculture. It is true that we already have some
means for carrying on general discussion in both these directions.
The Department of Agriculture, especially through its Office of
Experiment Stations, has acted as a center for the collection and dis-
semination of information regarding the organization of agricultural
education and research and methods of teaching and investigation.
The Association of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment
Stations has also served a most useful purpose in both these lines of
422
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
endeavor. It has, however, been felt by mam^ of the managers and
workers in our agricultural institutions that neither the dissemination
of publications nor the brief meetings of the Association of Colleges
and Stations sufficiently met the need for a center of discussion for
these general problems. For this reason the proposition for the
establishment of this Graduate School of Agriculture met with much
favor among the general officers of our institutions for agricultural
education and research as well as among the workers in these institip
tions. Though the period during which the sessions of this school
can be held is necessarily brief, it nevertheless gives a much longer
time for the discussion of these problems than is afforded by the meet-
ings of the Association of Colleges and Stations. By bringing together
here for a month a considerable number of our leading agricultural
teachers and investigators in these lines and a select body of the more
recent graduates of our agricultural colleges who are just entering or
about to enter on the work of teaching and investigation, it is believed
that we have a more efficient opportunity for live discussion of up-to-
date problems of agricultural education and research than has hitherto
existed.
Through the generous liberality of the trustees and officers of the
Ohio State University, the broad-minded approval of the honorable
Secretary of Agriculture, and the cordial cooperation of the Associa-
tion of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment Stations it
has been possible to put this enterprise on an efficient basis, and the
school therefore begins its sessions under most favorable auspices.
Considering the character of its faculty and students there is every
reason to believe that the entire session of the school will be filled with
the most earnest teaching and the most thorough discussion of the
subjects included in the course. In an unusual measure we believe
this school will furnish inspiration and up-to-date knowledge to workers
in our agricultural institutions, gathered out of many States and Ter-
ritories; but beyond this, we believe that in its ultimate results this
school will greatly aid in the formation of public opinion in favor of
the more thorough and rational organization of agricultural education
and research in the United States.
The school will aim to solidify and amplify the organization of edu-
cation and research in agricultural subjects on the basis of agriculture
itself, considered as both a science and an art. It will seek on the one
hand to help on the movement for grouping the results of investiga-
tion in many scientific lines into a fairly well-defined body of knowledge,
to be known as the science of agriculture, comparable with such sci-
ences as geology, geography, and medicine, and on the other hand to
quicken and broaden the movement for the direct application of science
in manifold ways to the art of agriculture. While we expect to pur-
sue our work with high standards of scientific and pedagogical effort,
we wjll not fora moment lose sight of the farmer and the requirements
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
423
of practical agriculture. All our labor will be counted as in vain if it
does not issue sooner or later in the growing of plants and animals
better adapted to the uses of men and the evolution of a system of
farming in which the financial returns shall be more satisfactory to the
intelligent and thrifty farmers, and under which the general level of
intelligence, comfort, and upright and harmonious living of our rural
population shall be perceptibly and increasingly raised.
We believe that the wide movement for the establishment of agri-
cultural schools, colleges, experiment stations, and departments of
agriculture, from which already such important results have come, has
in it vast potentialities not only for the bettering of the financial and
other material conditions of the rural population, but also, and far
more, for their intellectual and moral quickening. Wherever there is
a definite movement by which men pursue systematic and long-con-
tinued investigations along the line of any industry, whether in the
realm of administration, invention, or science, with the result that the
organization, processes, and appliance of that industry are changed in
the direction of more thorough system and greater complexit}\ there
follows necessarily higher intellectual activity and a more elevated
morality in the mass of workers in that industry.
Our aim, therefore, is a high one and our inspiration to the most
strenuous effort in the few weeks in which we are assembled in this
school is a lofty one. We seek to lay the lines and set the pace by
which the workers in the cause of agricultural education and research
in every State and Territory of this Union and in the most distant
island over which our flag floats shall march to the conquest of new
facts and principles which may be utilized for the advancement of
agricultural practice and the more efficient instruction of the farmer
and his children along agricultural lines.
Papers on the science of agriculture and the educational values of
courses in agriculture were read at this school by its dean, the sub-
stance of which is given below:
THE SCIENCE OF AGRICULTURE.
In order to make an intelligent and correct answer to the question
whether there is a science of agriculture, we must first clearly under-
stand what is meant by the terms u science” and 44 a science.” For this
purpose we may fairly appeal to books of reference in common use
which have been brought reasonably well up to date, so that they may
be taken as expressing the consensus of scholars on this subject in our
day. I ask your attention, therefore, first to the definition of science
given in Johnson’s Encyclopedia, revised edition:
Science. — In a general sense, knowledge reduced to order; that is, knowledge so
classified and arranged as to be easily remembered, readily referred to, and advan-
tageously applied. All science is based on the assumption that the laws of nature
424
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
are immutable. From this point of view science may be regarded as a knowledge of
the laws of nature, embracing the process of experiment, observation, and compari-
son, by which they are discovered, and the modes of reasoning by which their oper-
ation in the production of phenomena is made known. Hence most widely it signifies
the knowledge of a truth in relation to other truths.
Next let us examine the definitions of “science” and “a science”
given in the Standard Dictionary:
Science. — (1) Knowledge gained and verified by exact observation and correct
thinking, especially as methodically formulated and arranged in a rational system;
also, the sum of universal knowledge.
Science in the wide sense includes (1) science proper , embracing (a) exact knowl-
edge of facts (historical or empirical science), (6) exact knowledge of laws, obtained
by correlating facts (nomological science), and (c) exact knowledge of proximate
causes (rational science) ; and (2) philosophy. In the narrow sense of positive science
the word is used as including only the first two divisions of science proper.
A Science. — (2) Any department of knowledge in which the results of investiga-
tion have been worked out and systematized; an exact and systematic statement of
knowledge concerning some subject or group of subjects; especially- a system of
ascertained facts and principles covering and attempting to give adequate expression
to a great natural group or division of knowledge, as the sciences of astronomy,
botany, chemistry, and medicine; the science of theology.
We may, then, have a “Science of Agriculture,” provided there is
a body of knowledge about agriculture which has been “ gained and
verified by exact observation and correct thinking,” and “in which
the results of investigation have been worked out and systematized.”
This science should embrace (a) an exact knowledge of facts and
(b) an exact knowledge of laws, obtained by correlating facts.
But there are different kinds of facts and laws, and in order to see
what is the real character of the Science of Agriculture and its rela-
tion to other sciences it will be well to make at least a rough classifi-
cation of sciences.
There are, first, the mathematical and physical sciences, which deal
with the facts and laws of number and space and the properties of
matter The mathematical sciences are algebra, arithmetic, and
geometry. The physical sciences, considered as the sciences which
treat of dead matter, or of energy apart from vitality, are astronomy,
mechanics, physics, and chemistry.
These sciences which deal with the ultimate constitution of matter
may for our purpose be termed Primary Sciences.
Some may also consider biology, as the science of life or living
organisms, as a primary science; but as a matter of fact, we study
under the head of biology very largely the physics and chemistry
of the matter comprising living organisms, so that biological sciences
are really complex sciences which deal not so much with the ultimate
constitution of matter and life as with secondary facts and phenomena
as revealed in living organisms. The } 7 belong, therefore, to what may
be called Secondary Sciences.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
425
Thus physiology is very largely the physics and chemistry of the
plant or animal, as mineralogy is the physics and chemistry of min-
erals. These secondary sciences of course have their descriptive side,
under which the objects with which they deal are described and classi-
fied. Among the secondary sciences are botany, zoology, physiologj",
mineralogy, etc.
There is a third class of sciences which are of a still more complex
nature, dealing with large complex objects or groups of objects, and
making use in special ways of the facts and laws included in the
primary and secondary sciences. Such, for example, are the sciences
of geology, geography, and medicine, and in this class I would also
put the science of agriculture. For our purpose, at least, we may call
these sciences Tertiary Sciences.
Without doubt greater refinements of classification would be required
if we were making an exhaustive study of the relations of the various
sciences to each other. We should at the outset of such a study find
great difficulty in exactly defining the boundaries of each science, for
the more closely we study the different forms and groups of matter
and living organisms the more clearly we see the intermingling and
overlapping of laws and phenomena. The relations of this to our
present subject I shall briefly consider later. It will, however, help
to remove difficulties in defining the science of agriculture if we keep
in mind the somewhat rough and ready classification of sciences, which
I have made into three groups — Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary.
The primary sciences are those which deal with the constitution of
things.
The secondary sciences are those which classify and describe natural
objects and explain their constitution and functions — on the basis of
the primary sciences.
The tertiary sciences are those which deal with aggregations of
natural objects correlated so as to form a natural or artificial system,
which may be described as a whole, and the constitution and functions
of which may be explained on the basis of the primary and secondary
sciences.
From the complex and diverse nature of the systems with which the
tertiary sciences deal it is hardly to be expected that they can be satis-
factorily classified, or that they will individually permit of rigid and
adequate definition. It will always be somewhat 'difficult to differenti-
ate them absolutely from the sciences underlying them, but in this
respect they differ only in degree from the primary and secondary
sciences. In the development of modern science, with its almost limit-
less ramification sand the numerous points of view from which scientific
investigations may be pursued and their results recorded, it is no
longer possible to make logical and fixed boundaries for particular
sciences. Whether the science of nutrition, for instance, shall be con-
426
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
sidered physiological chemistry or chemical physiology or a branch of
biology^ — either botanical or zoological — will depend a good deal on
the point of view of the scientist defining it.
Nevertheless, I believe it is possible to sufficiently differentiate the
individual tertiary sciences so that they may be considered as organic
wholes rather than mere aggregations of underlying sciences. And,
as 1 shall endeavor to show later, I deem it very important that they
should be thus differentiated and studied. Let us, therefore, examine
the definitions which may T fairly be given to some of these tertiary
sciences.
The following outline of the main divisions of the sciences of geol-
ogy, geography, medicine, and agriculture may make clearer the com-
parative view of these sciences presented herewith :
Geology (science of litho-
sphere):
Dynamic Geology.
Petrography.
Structural Geology.
Physiography.
Historic Geology —
Stratigraphic.
Paleontologic.
Economic Geology.
Geologic Technology.
Medicine:
Pathology.
Medical Chemistry.
Pharmacology.
Therapeutics.
Surgery.
Hygiene and Sanitation.
Medical Jurisprudence.
Geography:
Mathematical (a) Astronomical.
(6) Mathematical
proper
Physical (a) Physiography.
(6) Hydrography.
Political (a) Ethnography.
( b ) Ethnology.
{ Geodesy.
Topography.
Cartography,
Agriculture:
r Agronomy. i Breeding.
Plant Production \ Horticulture. ^Culture.
Zootechny
l Forestry.
Mammaliculture.
Aviculture.
Pisciculture.
Apiculture.
Sericulture.
J Preservation.
Breeding.
Nutrition.
Management.
Agrotechny.
Rural Engineering.
Rural Economics.
Geology , as the science of the earth, or more strictly' of the litho-
sphere, may be subdivided as stated above. The relation of Geology^ to
other sciences is thus stated by G. K. Gilbert in Johnson’s Cyclopedia:
It is related to physical geography, the science of the surface. This relation is
peculiarly intimate, because the same series of changes which have produced the
texture and structure of the crust have also produced the forms of the surface, so that
the processes of change belong alike to dynamic geology and physical geography;
and physiography is claimed by both sciences. Mineralogy, though strictly a
department of chemistry, is interwoven with petrography, and their relations are
doubtless destined to become still more intimate as the genesis of rocks and minerals
comes to be better understood. Paleontology, though an inseparable part of historic
geology, is equally inseparable from biology; but while neither affiliation can be
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
427
abandoned, there is a well-developed tendency to divide this science into two parts—
biologic paleontology being concerned chiefly with the sequence or evolution of living
forms as illustrated by fossils, and geologic paleontology with the association of.fosals
in faunas and floras.
The development of the Science of Geography is well shown for our
present purposes in the following 1 extract from an article by Guyot
and Gilbert in Johnson’s Cyclopedia:
Geography is, literally, a description of the earth. This is General Descriptive Geog-
raphy. But the great process of physical and natural science, as well as the science
of man in all his conditions, has awakened a desire for a higher, more comprehen-
sive, and intelligent knowledge of the earth. To describe without rising to the
causes and descending to the consequences of the phenomena is not science. The
reflective mind craves more. While studying the earth in its natural aspects, it
wishes to learn why these natural phenomena are as they appear, how they are pro-
duced, and what laws govern them. It seeks to understand the relations of mutual
dependence that bind them together, as causes and effects, .into a vast system, into
one great individual mechanism, which is the terrestrial globe itself, with all it con-
tains. Such a science must endeavor to discover those incessant mutual actions of
the different portions of physical nature upon each other, of inorganic nature upon
organized beings — upon man in particular — and upon the successive development of
human societies; in a word, to study the reciprocal action of all these forces, the
perpetual play of which constitutes what might be called the life of the globe. This
is Scientific Geography , which may be defined as the science of the general phenomena
of the globe, and its life, in reference to their connection with mutual dependence.
It may be asked whether a science which thus embraces the whole domain of
nature and man has a claim to an individual existence; but when geology has taught
the composition of the earth’s crust and the history of its gradual formation, physics,
the laws which govern matter; when botany and zoology have classified the plants
and animals according to their affinities and differences in a grand system of life;
when ethnography and history have done their special work it still remains for geog-
raphy to trace out the relations of these various orders of things to each other.
Geography needs the results of all these sciences, but is not to be confounded with
them.
Geography, as the science of the earth, is naturally divided into three great depart-
ments corresponding to three orders of facts: The earth considered as a planet, a
part of the solar system, or Astronomical Geography; the earth considered in itself,
the Geography of Nature, or Physical Geography; the earth considered as the abode
of man, the Geography of Man. These three departments are usually called Mathe-
matical, Physical, and Political Geography.
I have given this account of geography because it illustrates very
well on what broad lines a Tertiary science may be constructed.
Geography, as a science in this modern sense, is of very recent date
and has hardly yet passed the time of struggle for recognition as a
distinct science. This is not remarkable, because the new science of
geography embraces material drawn from many sciences. Mathe-
matics, physics, botany, zoology, geology, astronomy, meteorology,
ethnology, and statistics — these at least are embraced in geography,
and there have been many scientists (of whom a few remain unto this
present day) who have claimed that geography is merely a loose
aggregation of materials drawn from different sciences, and should
428
REPORT OE OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
therefore not be considered as a distinct science. Others have claimed
that it is merely a branch of some existing science, e. g., astronomy
or geolog}^. But as geographers have kept at their work and have
elaborated and correlated the different parts of the science of geogra-
phy, the distinctiveness of this body of knowledge has become more
apparent and the advantages of studying the subjects included in
geography in a systematic way according to their groupings as geog-
raphy have been more clearly revealed. Hence in our best institu-
tions for higher learning, instead of being contented with giving the
student instruction in the sciences related to geography, special and
distinct courses in geography are being offered, and it is coming to be
recognized that even the teachers of elementary geography should
have special training in the science of geography in the normal school,
or the college or university.
The Science of Medicine is one of the Tertiary sciences, which, like
the science of agriculture, has been profoundly affected by recent
researches in other sciences. It is, therefore, in process of reconstruc-
tion. And one marked effect of the remarkable widening of the
scientific basis of the practice of medicine has been that the science of
medicine has lost that clear-cut definition which in past times it was
thought to have. For this reason, while there are numerous old
treatises in which elaborate classifications of the science of medicine
are set forth, such classifications have almost entirely disappeared from
the recent literature of medicine. At the same time we have in medical
institutions and treatises an advancing elaboration and differentiation
of courses and subjects bearing on the science of human disease and its
prevention or cure. On the basis of ' a thorough study of the consti-
tution, morphology, and physiology of the normal human being, the
modern science of medicine embraces pathology (anatomical and physi-
ological), medical chemistry, pharmacology, therapeutics, surgery,
hygiene and sanitation, and medical jurisprudence. Medicine is then a
science which uses materials drawn from many sciences. These mate-
rials are grouped in new and special ways with reference to their ulti-
mate usefulness as a basis for an art or practice. This practice is
clearly differentiated from the science and 3 T et indissolubH united with
it. In this respect medicine and agriculture are comparable. In the
case of both there is a science (now, as we believe, on a sound basis and
rapidily developing along right lines); but there is also a practice,
which is every year being more profoundly and beneficially affected
by the science explaining the principles on which its processes are
founded and revealing the facts and laws by means of which its opera-
tions may be further improved.
The Science of Agriculture is that body of knowledge (gained and
verified b} r exact observation and correct thinking, methodically for-
mulated and arranged in a rational system) in which the facts relating
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
429
to the production of plants and animals useful to man and the uses of
these plants and animals are accurately^ set forth, and a rational expla^
nation is given of the phenomena and laws involved in such production
and uses. It is obvious that this body of knowledge may be Variously
subdivided, according to different purposes of study or application.
But in order to bring out more clearly my conception of the science, I
shall now attempt to make and define one series of subdivisions.
Agriculture, as the science of the production and use of plants and
animals useful to man, may be divided into Plant Production, Animal
Production or Zootechny, Agricultural Technology or Agrotechny^,
Rural Engineering, and Rural Economics.
Under Plant Production is included whatever relates to the natural
or artificial environment (i. e., climate, soil, water, fertilizers) of use-
ful plants, their structure, composition, physiology", botanical relations,
varieties, geographical distribution, culture, harvesting, preservation,
and uses, and the obstructions to their growth, preservation, or use.
Plant Production may be subdivided into Agronomy, which deals
with what are commonly called field or farm corps; Horticulture,
which deals with vegetables, fruits, and ornamental plants, especially
as grown in gardens, small plantations, or parks; and Forestry, which
deals with trees and shrubs grown in large tracts. It is obvious that
the boundaries of these divisions of Plant Production can not be very
exact. Whether sweet potatoes or beans shall be called agronomical
or horticultural crops will depend largely on the conditions of their
culture; and whether a certain kind of a tree shall be considered a
forest tree or an ornamental plant, will depend on the method of its
culture and use. The science of Plant Production derives its materials
from meteorology , agricultural physics and chemistry, economic botany,
bacteriology, vegetable physiology- and pathology, economic entomol-
ogy, economic zoology, and perhaps from other sciences. But these
materials may be grouped in their relations to the processes involved
in the production and uses of different kinds of plants, so as to form a
distinct body of knowledge fairly entitled to the name of Science of
Plant Production as one of the divisions of the Science of Agriculture.
The Science of Plant Production may be subdivided either accord-
ing to groups of plants as suggested above, i. e., into Agronomy,
Horticulture, and Forestry, or along other lines, e. g., Plant Breeding,
Plant Culture, and Plant Preservation. Thus the plant breeder may be
differentiated from the plant physiologist as a man who is an expert
in the science of improving the varieties of useful plants for particular
purposes, taking into account the climate and soil in which the plants
are to be grown, and the economic uses to which they are to be put.
He must be a plant physiologist; but if he is only that, he will not be
a successful plant breeder. The plant culturist should understand the
physics and chemistry" of soils, the botanical relations and physiology
430
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
of useful plants, the uses to which these plants are devoted, and the
weeds, fungi, bacteria, insects, and other pests which may impede
their growth. He must know all this in relation to the problems of
the growth of plants under the actual conditions in field and green-
house, or he has not mastered the science, to say nothing of the art of
plant culture.
The second great division of the Science of Agriculture is Animal
Production, or Zootechny. This includes whatever relates to the
anatomy, physiology, zoological relations, domestication, types and
breeds, breeding, feeding, hygiene, management, and uses of useful
animals. It may also include the science which treats of diseases and
other impediments to the production of animals, i. e., Veterinary
Science, though this is in itself a large and distinct body of knowl-
edge, and bears only the same relation to Zootechny that the science
of medicine bears to anthropology.
Zootechny may be subdivided, according to the kinds of animals
studied, into Mammal iculture, Aviculture, Pisciculture, Apiculture,
Sericulture, or into such branches as Animal Breeding, Animal Nutri-
tion, and Animal Management.
Agrotechny includes whatever relates to the conversion of raw mate-
rials produced in agriculture into manufactured articles for use in
commerce and the arts. It may also include the processes of handling
these raw materials in connection with their commercial uses, as in
the case of milk and cream sold for consumption. It also involves
whatever relates to departures from standards set for manufactured
articles, i. e., adulterations and sophistications, in somewhat the same
way that the diseases of plants and animals are related to Agronomy
and Zootechny T . Agrotechny is naturally divided into specialties
according to the kinds of materials, e. g., foods and feeding stuffs,
liquors, oils, textiles, and leather. The subdivision of most importance
as a subject of school instruction in the United States is dairying.
Rural Engineering includes those branches of civil and mechanical
engineering which relate to the locating, arranging, and equipment of
farms and the construction and operation of farm implements and
machinery. It embraces the surveying of farms, the location of farm
buildings and works, the construction of buildings, water, irrigation,
drainage, and sewage system, and roads. It also involves the princi-
ples of mechanics as applied to farm machinery and the use of differ-
ent kinds of power for agricultural purposes. As a branch of the Sci-
ence of Agriculture it involves an understanding of the requirements
of the plants and animals to be grown and used on the farm, as well
as the needs of the human inhabitants as related to engineering
problems.
Rural Economics may be more or less broadly defined according to
the point of view. It at least includes whatever is related to agricul-
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
431
turo considered as a means for the production, preservation, and dis-
tribution of wealth by the use of land for the growing of plants and
animals. It may include the development of agriculture as a business
(history of agriculture), as well as the facts and principles of farm
management under present conditions. If formulated and studied in
its relation to the production and uses of useful plants and animals,
Rural Economics may fairly be claimed to be a branch of the Science
of Agriculture, though the same facts and principles may easily be so
grouped as to make a subdivision of political economy or sociology.
It should be understood that, while insisting on the existence of a
real Science of Agriculture, I do not claim that the boundaries of this
science can be determined with anything like mathematical precision.
But this is, as has already been said, also true in greater or less degree
of all the sciences.
It is also true that in making subdivisions of an} r science scholars
do not now insist on rigid divisions, or attach any very great impor-
tance to any particular scheme of classification. But when this has
been granted it must be insisted that, for such purposes as the organ-
ization of courses of study and the administration of great insti-
tutions of research, there should be the recognition of such sciences as
geolog} T , geography, medicine, and agriculture as the basis for the
organization of the curriculum or administrative system; for practi-
cally a good deal depends in our colleges and scientific institutions on
the point of view of the managers, teachers, and investigators. As
long as we admit the nonexistence of a Science of Agriculture, and
are satisfied with aiding agriculture through teaching and investigation
in the sciences related to agriculture, we shall have boards of trustees
and college presidents who will be satisfied when their chemists, physi-
cists, and botanists add to their ordinary teaching of the principles
of chemistry, pl^sics, and botany a limited amount of information
regarding the application of those sciences to agriculture; and the
teachers themselves, approaching the subject from the standpoint of
the primary or secondary sciences, will be most likely to subordinate
the agricultural side of their instruction to the general view of their
favorite science; so that the pupils will learn a great deal more about
the relations of agricultural subjects to botany or chemistry than they
will about the relation of botanical and chemical knowledge to the
production of useful plants and animals.
The establishment of such an organization as the Bureau of Plant
Industry in the Department of Agriculture marks an immense gain,
not only in effectiveness of administration, but in the relation of the
scientific effort of the investigators to agriculture. Now, the men in
that Bureau feel that they are working primarily as agricultural scien-
tists rather than merely as botanists. Their outlook toward their
work is changed; there is a disposition to lay under contribution every
432
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
science required to work out the complex problems of agriculture,
and there is every reason to believe that they will accomplish for the
Science of Plant Production, as part of the Science of Agriculture,
what that great Bureau known as the Geological Survey has done for
the Science of Geology. All questions regarding the exact boundaries
of the Science of Agriculture or of its subdivisions sink into insignifi-
cance when compared with the substantial fact that there is a rapidly
increasing body of knowledge which fairly constitutes a Science of
Agriculture, and that by organizing our colleges of agriculture, experi-
ment stations, and Department of Agriculture on the basis of this
science we may secure such increased efficiency of work and adminis-
tration as will greatfy widen the scope and thoroughness of this
science, and, through its effective application to practice in an ever-
increasing number of ways, do more to improve the art of agriculture
than would ever be possible as long as there were simply fragments of
knowledge regarding agricultural subjects scattered through a score
of sciences.
The fact that there is an art of agriculture, and that this art in its
cruder forms involves comparatively simple operations, in no wa} T
militates against the need and feasibility of having a science of agri-
culture. There is a practice of medicine as well as a science of
medicine. In his humbler work the doctor or the surgeon performs
many simple manual operations which have been similarly performed
for thousands of years and long prior to the formulation of any science
of medicine.
We readily grant that the operations of agriculture ma} r be per-
formed by persons ignorant of the science, but it is already evident
that a right knowledge of the science may be very helpful in the
practice of the art. It is also becoming apparent that the teaching of
chemistry, botany, and zoology, even on their economic sides, is not
enough to satisfy the needs of agriculture. There must be teaching
of the science of agriculture as such, from the university down.
The method of m} r present discussion of the science of agriculture
has been chosen because there are still those who rank high in scien-
tific and pedagogical circles who claim that there is no such thing as a
science of agriculture, and this view of the matter has not onfy
had great influence in shaping courses of instruction and methods of
investigation along agricultural lines in the past, but is still operating
in our colleges and experiment stations to prevent the formulation of
vastly better courses of instruction and methods of investigation in
these lines.
W ithout doubt, the theoretical and practical denial of the possibility
of a science of agriculture has had much to do with the comparative^
slow growth of the science and the present unsatisfactory condition
of agricultural instruction in many of our colleges. Nevertheless, a
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
433
science of agriculture has been developed and has already reached
such a stage that its claims are each year being more distinctly recog-
nized in our agricultural colleges.
The differentiation of the body of knowledge, which may fairly be
called the science of agriculture, from the other sciences will lead to
profound changes in the methods of teaching agricultural subjects, the
equipment for such instruction, and the arrangement of courses to
meet the needs of different classes of students. We are, in fact,
already in the midst of such changes. The most obvious result of
this movement thus far is the division of the subject of agriculture
among several instructors in a college, so as to make at least the
beginnings of a real agricultural facult}^. Thus we now have quite
commonly in our agricultural colleges professors of agronomy, animal
husbandry (zootechny), dairying, horticulture, and veterinary science.
When a group of instructors is thus formed the natural consequence
is a special building in which they may work, to a certain extent at
least, in cooperation. When the building is provided it is seen to be
appropriate and desirable that it should contain special arrangements,
facilities, apparatus, etc., suited to the requirements of the subjects to
be taught in it. This leads the instructors in several branches of agri-
culture to set their wits to work to devise special arrangements and
apparatus which will improve the quality and thoroughness of their
instruction. Along with this there is more study of the relation of
the different topics to each other in a scheme of instruction, the rear-
rangement of courses, the improvement of methods of teaching, and
the discussion of the whole subject of the pedagogy of agricultural
science. Such a ferment and development is already making trouble
for the presidents and boards of trustees of our agricultural colleges.
The simple and inexpensive facilities which have hitherto sufficed for
agricultural instruction will no longer do. Agriculture claims, and is
now in a position to rightly claim, the same kind of treatment as is
now quite generally accorded to engineering and mechanic arts. If
the teachers of agriculture are really alive to their business and suc-
cessful in their endeavors to systematize their subjects and improve
the quality of their teaching, they will devise and develop methods,
apparatus, and illustrative material which will call for an increased
amount of money to properly house and maintain. We shall have
failed in one of the great purposes of this summer school if the
teachers of agriculture here assembled do not return to their respect-
ive institutions better prepared and mqre in earnest to contend in
every proper way for the development and increase of the agricul-
tural faculties, and the facilities for agricultural instruction. This
is not a matter of tine buildings and extensive fields. The real prob-
lem before the agricultural faculties is to devise more and better
apparatus; to discover far better methods of utilizing the college
S. Doc. 104 28
434
REPOET OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
farm as a real agricultural laboratory; to provide live-stock rooms
and barns and plant houses, which will be of more real use as aids to
instruction. The more the teachers of agriculture show they have
grasped the pedagogic principles involved in the proper presentation
of their subjects to students, and the more the} r collect and utilize
appropriate apparatus and illustrative material, the easier it will be to
get for them proper housing and equipment. What we need especially
now are original and ingenious teachers. Really competent men have
a better chance of great success than ever before.
Meanwhile the investigations in progress in experiment stations and
the Department of Agriculture and kindred institutions are rapidty
widening the boundaries of the science of agriculture and increasing
the material for instruction. Those men who are sifting the results
of these investigations and writing books and other summaries are
performing a very useful service. The science must have a form and
body in literature before it can hope for general recognition. Its
claims are being recognized in a hopeful way by the editors of diction-
aries, cj^clopedias, and other general works of reference. The great
Cyclopedia of Horticulture marks a distinct gain for the cause of agri-
cultural science, and will, it is to be hoped, soon be supplemented by
a Cyclopedia of Agriculture.
There need be no fear that the elaboration of the Science of Agri-
culture, the definition of its relation to the primary and secondaiy sci-
ences, and the making of more thorough and severe requirements for
courses in agriculture in our colleges will stand in the way of broad-
ening the field of agricultural instruction, so as to make it reach the
great body of our youths in agricultural communities, who, from the
necessities of their condition and environment, will not be able to
attend our colleges. On the contrary, the more definite the Science
of Agriculture is made, and the more thorough the pedagogics of
agricultural instruction become, the easier it will be to provide good
text-books and manuals for elementary instruction in agriculture, and
to prepare courses and teachers of agricultural subjects for the lower
schools. Hand in hand with the improvement and definition of the
Science of Geography, the establishment of university courses on this
subject, and the enlargement of geographical research, has gone the
improvement of the text-books and manuals of geography in all grades
of schools, and the betterment of teachers and facilities for instruction
in this subject. The lowest grades of schools, as well as the highest,
have realized beneficial effect^ from the thorough overhauling of geo-
graphical science which the past quarter of a century has witnessed.
A^d so it will be with agriculture. As definite results of investiga-
tions accumulate, as college courses are improved, as thorough trea-
tises on agricultural science multiply, it w r ill be easier to devise effective
and useful nature-study lessons in agricultural subjects for our ele-
mentary schools, suitable outline courses in the theory and practice of
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
435
agriculture for our high schools, and good secondary courses in gen-
eral agriculture, in horticulture, in dairying, and in other special
branches for the special agricultural schools, which have already been
so successfully conducted in a few places* and which we hope and
expect to see established before long in many agricultural regions of
our country.
I have spoken of these things because I deem it of great importance
at this juncture that our teachers and investigators should regard the
definition and formulation of a Science of Agriculture as a matter of
prime importance. For with the establishment and general recogni-
tion of such a science will come, not only the broadening and strength-
ening of institutions for higher research and education in agricultural
subjects, but also a vast widening of the range of agricultural education,
until it permeates the mass of our rural population and shows its
beneficial results in the general elevation of the intellectual activities
of our agricultural people, as well as in the improvement of the mate-
rial conditions and gains of our agricultural practice. For the Science
of Agriculture is one of those peculiar products of our broader and
better conceptions of the field and office of science. It exists not for
itself alone, but rather for the betterment of mankind.
EDUCATIONAL VALUES OF COURSES IN AGRICULTURE.
The educational values of courses in agriculture are determined
by the same pedagogic standards as are applied to courses in other
subjects.
According to President Eliot, of Harvard Universit} 7 , the essential
constituents of education in the highest sense are as follows: 44 We
must learn to see straight and clear; to compare and infer; to make an
accurate record; to remember; to express our thoughts with precision,
and to hold fast on lofty ideals.” u There is also,” he says, 4 4 general
recognition of the principle that effective power in action is the true
end of education rather than the storing up of information or the
cultivation of faculties which are mainly receptive, discriminating, or
critical.”
According to Professor Hanus, professor of education in the same
university, the subjects of instruction in a modern school course of
study may be classified as follows: 44 (1) Language and literature; (2)
social study— history (including the history of industry and commerce,
as well as political history), government, descriptive economics; (3)
art (including the history of art, as well as drawing, painting, model-
ing, music); (4) mathematics; (5) physical and biological science; and
(6) manual training.”
The first two classes of subjects have a higher educational value,
theoretically, provided the student is interested in them, but if he has
a greater interest in subjects of the other classes, they may have for
him a higher educational value and may be advantageously used for
436
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS;
the development of habits of efficiency. The individuality of the
pupil is considered of more importance as the pupil advances in age
and maturity. School courses, especially in high school and college,
should therefore particularly promote the development of each pupil’s
dominant interests and powers, and further should seek to render these
interests and powers subservient to life’s serious purposes, which
include self-support or some worthy form of service, and intelligent,
active participation in human affairs.
In this view of the educational problem as related to modern civili-
zation with its elaborate industrial system, we do well to unite culture
and vocational studies in school and college courses.
In considering the courses of study for our agricultural colleges in
the light of these pedagogic principles, we should always bear in mind
that a properly constituted agricultural course, taken as a whole, wdll
include both culture and vocational studies. This is well illustrated
by the course of study proposed for our agricultural colleges by stand-
ing’ committees of the Association of American Agricultural Colleges
and Experiment Stations. This four-} T ear college course includes
English, modern languages, psychology, ethics, political economy, gen-
eral history, constitutional law, drawing, algebra, geometry, and trigo-
nometry, as culture studies; next there are the pure sciences — physics,
chemistry, botany, zoology, physiolog} r , geology, and meteorology;
lastly, the vocational studies — agriculture, horticulture and forestry,
veterinary science, and agricultural chemistry. As regards the time
assigned to these subjects, we find two-thirds of the entire course is
occupied with culture and scientific studies, leaving one-third of the
time for agricultural science and its applications to the art of agricul-
ture.
There is no need, then, to discuss the educational values of two-thirds
of this course, for these are already well established. It will perhaps
help us to determine more accurately the educational values of the
remaining third, i. e., the agricultural portion of the course, if we
divide it into two sections. A large part of it consists of the study of
the different branches of the science of agriculture. Essentially these
have educational values as scientific studies, varying according to their
nature and scope. In their entirety they cover quite a wide range,
since they include materials drawn from physics, chemistry, various
biological sciences, engineering, and economics. Leaving out for
the present the manual operations which we desire to consider sepa-
rate^ as the second section of the agricultural division of the college
course, agricultural science embraces all the other lines of instruction
laid down by Professor Hanus, except language and literature; that
is, it includes physical and biological science, mathematics, art, and
social study. Properly taught, the student of agricultural science will
" See straight and clear, compare and infer, make an accurate record,
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
437
remember, express his thoughts with precision, and hold fast on lofty
ideals.”
From the complex nature of the agricultural sciences they should
have high educational values along these different lines.
The objects, facts, and phenomena brought before the student of
agricultural science are of such a kind as to test his capacity to “ see
straight and clear” in a very high degree. Whatever previous train-
ing he has had in this line will doubtless aid him in this new and higher
field of science; but however good his previous training, he wull find
very much to train and to develop his perceptive powers in observing
the complex things involved in agricultural science. The soil, culti-
vated plants, domestic animals are not simple and elementary things,
easy to be apprehended and comprehended. If we are to know them
in any accurate sense, we must see straight and clear and long. These
agricultural subjects also furnish innumerable opportunities for com-
parisons, most of which will be far from simple, and the problems
of correct inferences in this line of study are as difficult as they are
multitudinous.
The classification of soils and the determination of their relative fer-
tility and adaptation to different crops, the judging of live stock on
the broad basis of their fitness for particular uses, what opportunities
in such studies “to compare and infer.” Considered as “mental gym-
nastics” a class in stock judging may have as much exercise as a class
puzzling- over the mysteries of the Latin or Greek subjunctive mood —
that is, if our agricultural students are taught and not lectured.
No one would dispute that the agricultural subjects give ample
opportunity for exercise in “making an accurate record” of what is
learned.
Memory certainly need not lack for exercise amid the innumerable
multitude of items included in these agricultural subjects. It is
undoubtedly a pity that memory training is too much neglected in our
modern educational schemes, but this is not for lack of materials on
which to work; it is often a lack of proper selection of things to be
remembered, or the misguided effort to remember too many unimpor-
tant items.
And if ever there were subjects in which it was desirable to express
our thought with precision it is these agricultural subjects. If only
agricultural writers, teachers, and students would learn to do that,
so that we might distinguish between their actual knowledge and their
theories, it would be a great gain for the cause of truth and science.
And the expression of the thought may come through language or
mathematics or the graphic arts.
It also may be fairly claimed that the study of agriculture in its
human relations may have an ethical side of much educational value.
We should teach men in our agricultural colleges to be intelligent
438
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
farmers, not simply that they may thus make a better living, but also
that they may be leaders in making agriculture alive, progessive art,
which in the future shall provide a more stable and satisfacton^ basis
for thrifty, intelligent, and refined rural communities, as well as a
stronger guarant} T for the manufactures, commerce, art, literature,
and science of a higher civilization, in which industrial and civil peace,
and not war, shall be the established order.
But the relative educational value of agricultural courses will depend
largely on the methods of teaching employed. Among the pedagogic
principles which should underlie good teaching of agricultural subjects
are the following:
(1) The foundation of educational success in agricultural courses
must be laid in the interest of the student. The teacher should, how-
ever, remember that this is not the only principle to be observed.
There may be much interest without much instruction. The stump
speaker often excites his hearers to the highest pitch of interest with-
out giving them any useful information, and a teacher may keep
pupils in an excited state of mind without their makipg any material
progress in learning.
(2) There should be careful selection and systematic arrangement of
topics to be taught in a given course, so that the student will learn the
most important things which he needs to know, and will be put in
possession of a system of truth regarding agriculture which he can
grasp and hold as a permanent mental possession.
(3) The methods of teaching agricultural subjects should be such as
to afford the opportunitj r and impose the necessity on the student of
exerting himself strenuously to gain the mastery of these subjects —
hence the advantage of the so-called laboratory methods as contrasted
with lecturing.
(4) To give a high educational value to agricultural courses atten-
tion must be paid to the time element in education, meaning b} r this
not so much the duration of agricultural courses as the relative amount
of mental activity compressed into a given time through skillful teach-
ing. Hence the necessity of much attention to the devising of labora-
tory methods of instruction which will permit rapid and varied work,
the previous preparation of materials, so that there may not be delays
in the class room, and the holding of the student to strenuous effort
from first to last.
(5) The educational value, of course, in agriculture will also depend
on the extent to which they are made the means for developing origi-
nality and executive capacity in the students. It is not enough that
through such courses the student shall gain much exact and useful
knowledge or correct methods of activity. He should acquire ability
to seek and find new truth and to guide and control the activities of
other men in practical scientific lines. The college graduate is not the
Agricultural Education— College of Agriculture, University of Illinois.
Senate Doc. No. 1 04.
Plate XLII
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
439
nan lie ought to be unless he is capable of adding to the sum of human
knowledge and becoming a leader in human progress. The quality of
the future work of our experiment stations and departments of agri-
culture will depend on the original power developed in the graduates
from our agricultural courses. The progress of the practical agri-
culture of this country in competition with the world will depend very
largely on the quality of the leadership of the graduates from these
agricultural courses. And the organization of the agricultural indus-
tries on right lines, as well as the betterment of the social condition of
agricultural communities, will naturally depend very much on the
work of the agricultural colleges and their graduates. The signs all
point to the wider and stronger influence of educated men in the large
affairs of industry and public business, including the narrower range
of public business which we ordinarily call the government. In these
broad lines there will be abundant opportunities for agricultural gradu-
ates to make for themselves honorable and useful careers. Their
success in this direction will depend largely on the quality of the
teaching they receive in agricultural courses.
COLLEGE COURSES IN AGRICULTURE.
The movement for the specialization of the different branches of the
science of agriculture and the development of a highly organized
faculty in our agricultural colleges has gone furthest in the Colleg'e of
Agriculture of the University of Illinois (PI. XLII), of which Prof.
Eugene Davenport is dean. The aims and scope of the instruction
given in this college are set forth in the university catalogue for
1901-2, from which the following statements are taken:
AIMS AND SCOPE.
The College of Agriculture offers students an education designed to fit them for the
business of farming and at the same time to furnish a means of culture. This educa-
tion is, therefore, partly technical and partly cultural. Its end is the training of
students to be not only successful farmers, but good citizens and successful men as
well. In other words, it seeks to provide an education suitable to the needs of rural
people.
Of the courses leading to graduation in the College of Agriculture, the technical
portion constitutes about one-half of the entire work of the student. Of the remain-
ing portion of the course, thirty-five hours are prescribed in the sciences nearest
related to agriculture. Since the technical subjects are also of a scientific character,
the course as a whole is essentially scientific, rather than literary; yet the college is
mindful of the educational importance of history, literature, language, and the polit-
ical sciences, and reasonable attention is therefore given to these subject and their
pursuit is encouraged by a liberal amount of open electives.
The college also offers, through the department of household science, a variety of
courses especially treating of the affairs of the home.
440
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
METHODS OF INSTRUCTION.
Of the 20 instructors in technical subjects, 16 devote their entire time to agricul-
ture. Instruction is by laboratory work, supplemented by text-books, lectures, and
reference readings, which are almost constantly assigned from standard volumes
and periodicals. The student is brought into close practical contact with his subject.
He takes levels, lays tile, tests the draft of tools, traces root systems of corn and
other crops, tests germination of seeds, determines the fertility in soils and the effects
of different crops and of different rotations upon soil fertility. He does budding,
grafting, trimming, and spraying, and works out problems in landscape gardening.
He tests milk, operates separators, makes and judges butter and cheese. He studies
cuts of meat and samples of wool, judges a great variety of animals, and has practice
in diagnosing and treating their diseases.
EQUIPMENT.
The college keeps on deposit from the largest manufacturers several thousand
dollars’ worth of plows, cultivators, planters, cutters, shelters, grinders, mowers,
binders, engines, etc. It has extensive collections of agricultural plants and seeds
and their products. Laboratories are well equipped with apparatus and appliances
for the study of manures, fertilizers, fertility of soils, soil physics, soil bacteriology,
germination of seeds, corn judging, etc. The grounds of the university and the
fields and orchards of the experiment station are always available for illustration in
class work. An illustrative series of colored casts of fruit and enlarged models of
fruits and flowers, collections of seeds and woods, cabinets of beneficial and noxious
insects with specimens of their work, photographs, maps, charts, drawings, and lan-
tern slides all afford valuable material for study and illustration.
Specimens of Morgan horses; Shorthorn, Jersey, Ayrshire, and Holstein-Friesian
cattle; Shropshire, Merino, and Dorset sheep, and Berkshire swine afford material
for judging. This material, moreover, is largely increased by loans from prominent
herds. In the dairy department is a complete outfit for a milk-testing laboratory
and for cream separation and butter and cheese making. The department of veteri-
nary science owns a collection illustrating materia medica, a collection of pathological
specimens illustrating special abnormal bony development, and a papier-mache
model of a horse, capable of dissection, and showing every important detail of
structure. 'In addition are levels, lanterns, microscopes, and cameras, an extensive
list of agricultural journals, a complete file of experiment station bulletins from all
the States, and an excellent assortment of standard reference books, including nearly
all the pedigree registers published.
DESCRIPTION OF DEPARTMENTS.
AGRONOMY.
The department of agronomy, with a staff of six, gives instruction in those subjects
which relate especially to the field and its affairs, as drainage, farm machinery, field
crops, the physics and bacteriology of the soil, manures, rotation and fertility, the
history of agriculture, farm management, and comparative agriculture. The object
is to acquaint the student with the facts and principles connected with the improve-
ment of soils, the preservation of fertility, the nature of the various crops and the
conditions governing their successful and economic production, and with the devel-
opment of agriculture. This object is attained bv the application of the laboratory
methods of study to these subjects, supplemented with lectures, class-room work,
n nd a free use of standard literature.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 441
ANIMAL HUSBANDRY.
In this department three instructors give courses covering the separate study of
sheep, swine, beef, and dairy cattle and their products; heavy and light horses, with
their care and training; the management of farm herds, and the principles and
practices of feeding and of breeding. The purpose is to familiarize the student with
animals, first, as to their fitness for specific purposes; second, as to their care and
management; third, as to their improvement by breeding, and fourth, as to the
commercial production of animal products. This familiarity is gained by an exhaust-
ive study of the uses of domestic animals, the history and character of their breeds,
together with extensive practice in stock judging, supplemented by a careful study
of the methods of successful stockmen and of the known principles of feeding and of
organic evolution.
DAIRY HUSBANDRY.
Three instructors give extended courses in the study of milk and its economic pro-
duction; the characteristics . of the dairy cow and the management of dairy farms;
the separation of cream and the making of butter and cheese; factory management;
dairy bacteriology; city milk supply and the standardizing and pasteurizing of milk
and cream.
HORTICULTURE.
Five instructors conduct courses in orchard management, small-fruit culture, and
vegetable gardening, nut culture, floriculture, landscape gardening, and forestry; in
fruit propagation, greenhouse management, and the evolution of cultivated plants,
and in commercial horticulture and nursery management. The purpose is to acquaint
the student with the principles and practice of fruit raising and vegetable gardening,
both for home and market, and with successful methods of combating insect and
fungus -enemies. The sense of the beautiful is cultivated and given expression in
floriculture and landscape gardening, to the end that more of nature’s beauty shall
pervade the home and its surroundings. The student studies plant life and learns
how to propagate, cultivate, and improve the forms that have been found useful or
ornamental in the way of vegetables, fruits, flowers, and trees. As in other depart-
ments, he follows the methods of the laboratory in that he learns to do by doing,
supplementing everything with numerous references to standard literature.
HOUSEHOLD SCIENCE.
The department of household science stands for a recognition of the importance of
adequate and proper training for home duties. It aims to provide opportunity for a
scientific study of some of the problems of the management of the house, including
the distribution of income according to recognized business principles.
The courses of instruction given in the department are planned to meet the needs
of two classes of students, viz, (a) those students who specialize in other lines of
work, but desire a knowledge of the general principles and facts of household science;
( b ) those students who wish to make a specialty of household science by a compre-
hensive study of the affairs of the home, together with the arts and sciences whose
applications are directly connected with the management and care of the home.
The department occupies the entire second floor of the north wing of the agricul-
tural building and is supplied with laboratories, apparatus, and illustrative material,
such as charts, specimens of various kinds of building material, and exhibits illus-
trating the chemical composition and products obtained in the manufacture of cer-
tain foods.
The students have access also to the museum of the architectural department, as
well as the benefit of close association with the art department.
442
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
VETERINARY SCIENCE.
Courses are offered in veterinary anatomy and physiology, in veterinary materia
medica, and in the theory and practice of veterinary medicine and surgery. The
object is to acquaint the student with the structure and activities of animals in health,
the characteristic symptoms of disease, and the materials and methods of successful
treatment. He therefore makes careful study of the structure of domestic animals
and of the nature of their derangements and the characteristic action of remedial
agents. The weekly clinic gives opportunity for practical experience in the diagnosis
and treatment of the more ordinary diseases.
COURSES OFFERED.
The College of Agriculture offers the following courses leading to the degree of
bachelor of science: Agricultural course; general course.
AGRICULTURAL COURSE.
This course is designed to tit young men for the business and relations of country
life. Students may graduate upon completing the studies of the prescribed list (and
a specified number of electives).
Classification of subjects.
Prescribed.
Agronomy.
Animal husbandry.
Botany.
Chemistry.
Dairy husbandry
Economics.
Geology.
Horticulture.
Military.
Physical training.
Rhetoric.
Thremmatology.
Zoology.
[A list of the different courses offered i
of the topics included in each course, folk
Elective.
Agronomy. «
Animal husbandry. «
Botany . a
Dairy husbandry. «
Horticulture . a
English.
Rhetoric . a
Zoology . a
Veterinary science.
the agricultural subjects, with an outline
vs.]
AGRONOMY.
1. Drainage and irrigation . — Location of drains and irrigation conduits, leveling, dig-
ging, laying tile and pipes, filling, and subsequent care; cost of construction and
efficiency; sewers for the disposal of waste water from farm buildings and the sewage
from kitchen and toilet; farm water pipes, pipe and thread cutting. Class work,
laboratory, and field practice.
2. Field machinery . — The tools and machinery of the field — plows, harrows, and
hoes; seeders, drills, corn and potato planters; cultivators, weeders, and spraying
machines; mowers, rakes, self-binders, corn harvesters and huskers, potato diggers,
wagons, etc. Class work and laboratory practice, including setting up and testing
machines, noting construction and elements necessary for successful work.
« Courses in addition to those prescribed.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
443
3. Farm power machinery. — Horsepowers, gas engines, traction engines, windmills,
pumps, corn shellers, feed cutters, grinders, and thrashing machines — their construc-
tion, efficiency, durability, and care. Class room and laboratory work.
4. Farm buildings , fences , and roads. — The arrangement, design, construction, and
cost of farm buildings, especially of barns, granaries, and silos; the different kinds
of fences, their cost, construction, efficiency, and durability; cost and construction of
roads and walks. Class work and practice in designing and drafting buildings,
operating fence-building machines, setting and testing fence posts, making walks, etc.
5. Farm crops. — Quality and improvement. Judging of corn and oats, wheat grad-
ing, methods of improving quality, shrinkage of grain, care of stored crops to prevent
injury and loss. Class and laboratory work.
6. Farm crops. — Germination and growth. Vitality and germination of seeds,
preservation of seeds, methods of seeding; conditions of plant growth; peculiarities
of the different agricultural plants in respect to structure, habits, and requirements
for successful growth; enemies to plant growth — weeds and weed seeds, their identi-
fication and methods of destruction, fungus diseases, such as smut of oats and
wheat, and blight, scab, and rot of potatoes, methods of prevention; insects injurious
to farm crops, and how to combat them. Class room, laboratory, and field work.
7. Special crops. — A special study of farm crops taken up under an agricultural out-
line — grain crops, root crops, forage crops, sugar and fiber crops — their history and
distribution over the earth, methods of culture, cost of production, consumption of
products, and residues or by-products. Class work supplemented by practical field
work and a study of the results of previous experiments, such as detasseling corn,
injury to roots of corn by cultivation; selection and breeding of corn and other crops,
with special reference to practices which apply directly to Illinois conditions. Stu-
dents will have an excellent opportunity to study the work of the agricultural
experiment station.
8. Field experiments. — Special work by the students, conducted in the field. This
work consists in testing varieties of corn, oats, wheat, potatoes, and other farm crops;
methods of planting corn, seeding grains, grasses, and other forage crops; culture of
corn, potatoes, and sugar beets; practice in treating oats and wheat for smut, and
potatoes for scab, and studying the effects upon the crops; combating chinch bugs
and other injurious insects. Other practical experiments may be arranged with the
instructor. Special opportunities will be given to advanced students of high-class
standing to take up experiments, under assignment and direction of the instructor
in farm crops, on certain large farms in the State, arrangements having been made
with the farm owners or managers for such experiments.
9. Soil physics and management. — This course is designed to prepare the student
better to understand the effects of the different methods of treatment of soils, and the
influence of these methods upon moisture, texture, aeration, fertility, and produc-
tion. It comprises a study of the origin of soils, of the various methods of soil for-
mation, of their mechanical composition and classification; of soil moisture and
means for conserving it; of soil texture as affecting capillarity, osmosis, diffusion,
and as affected by plowing, harrowing, cultivating, rolling, and cropping; of the
wasting of soils by washing; fall or spring plowing and drainage as affecting mois-
ture, temperatures, and root development. The work of the class room is supple-
mented by laboratory work, comprising the determination of such questions as
specific gravity, relative gravity, water-holding capacity, and capillary power of vari-
ous soils; also the study of the physical effects of different systems of rotation and of
continuous cropping with various crops, and the mechanical analysis of soils.
10. Special problems in soil physics. — This work is intended for students wishing to
specialize further in the study of the physical properties of soils, and will include
the determination by electrical methods of the temperature, moisture, and soluble
444
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
salt content of various soils under actual field conditions; effect of different depths
of plowing, cultivation, and rolling on soil conditions; effects of different methods of
preparing seed beds; the physical questions involved in the formation and redemp-
tion of the so-called “alkali,” “barren,” or “dead dog” soils, and of other peculiar
soils of Illinois.
11. Soil bacteriology. — A study of the morphology and activities of the bacteria w T hich
are connected with the elaboration of plant food in the soil or which induce changes
of vital importance to agriculture, with regard to the effects of cropping and tillage
upon these organisms, and with special reference to the study of those forms which
are concerned with the formation of nitrates and nitrites in the soil, and with the
accumulation of nitrogen by leguminous crops. Class room and laboratory work.
12. Fertilizers , rotations , and fertility. — The influence of fertility, natural or sup-
plied, upon the yield of various crops; the effect of different crops upon the soil and
upon succeeding crops; different rotations and the ultimate effect of different systems
of farming upon the fertility and productive capacity of soils. The above will be
supplemented by a laboratory study of manures and fertilizers; their composition,
and their agricultural and commercial value; of soils cropped continuously with dif-
ferent crops and with a series of crops; of the fertility of soils of different types or
classes from different sections of Illinois.
13. Investigation of the fertility of special soils. — This course is primarily designed to
enable the student to study the fertility of those special soils in which he may be
particularly interested, and to become familiar with the correct principles and
methods of such investigations. It will include the determination of the nature and
quantity of the elements of fertility in the soils investigated, the effect upon various
crops of different fertilizers added to the soils, as determined by pot cultures, and,
where possible, by plat experiments. This work will be supplemented by a system-
atic study of the work of experiment stations and experimenters along these lines
of investigations.
14. History of agriculture. — The history and development of agricultural practice
and progress, wfith special reference to the methods employed in ancient times and
the effect upon agriculture of the introduction of rational crop rotations, the intelli-
gent use of fertilizers, the introduction of machinery, and the systematic breeding of
animals and plants.
15. Comparative agriculture. — Reasons for the differences in the agriculture of dif-
ferent times, peoples, and countries, and why it is that the agriculture of a region
or of a farm is a definite and individual problem, together with the need of harmo-
nizing agricultural practice with natural conditions as well as with the findings of
science; circumstances that influence agricultural practice, as soil, climate, machin-
ery, race, custom, land tenure, etc., and what is best under different conditions.
16. German agricultural readings. — A study of the latest agricultural experiments
and investigations published in the German language, special attention being given
to soils and crops. The current numbers of German journals of agricultural science
will be required and used as a text. This course is designed to give the student a
broader knowledge of the recent advances in scientific agriculture, and, incidentally,
it will aid him in making a practical application of a foreign language. It is recom-
mended that it be taken after agronomy.
17. Special work in farm mechanics. — Students may arrange for special work in any
of the lines covering drainage or farm machinery, either in the second semester or
the summer.
18. Investigation and thesis. — This course varies in the subject-matter of study
according to the department in which theses are written. The w r ork is under the
direction of the head of the department in which the work is done.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
445
HORTICULTURE.
1. Principles of fruit growing. — This course, which is designed for all students in the
college of agriculture, deals with the fundamental principles of fruit culture. It
embraces a study of location with reference to climate and markets, planting, soil
treatment, pruning, protection from insects and diseases, harvesting, and marketing.
Recitations, reference readings, and practical exercises.
2. Small-fruit culture. — A study of the strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, dewberry,
currant, gooseberry, cranberry, and juneberry ; each studied with reference to history,
importance, and extent of cultivation, soil, location, fertilizers, propagation, plant-
ing, tillage, pruning, insect enemies, diseases, varieties, harvesting, marketing, profits.
Recitations and reference readings, with occasional practical exercises.
3. Vegetable gardening. — Kitchen and market gardening, including a study of all
the common vegetables.
4. Plant houses. — The construction and management of plant houses, with especial
reference to the growing of vegetables under glass. Text-book and laboratory work.
5. Plant propagation. — Grafting, budding, layering, making cuttings, pollination,
seedage, etc. Text-book and laboratory work.
6. Nursery methods. — A study of some details of nursery management and their
relation to horticulture in general. Lectures and reference readings.
7. Spraying. — The theory and practice of spraying plants, embracing a study of
materials and methods employed in the combating of insects and fungus diseases.
Recitations, reference readings, and laboratory work.
8. Orcharding. — A comprehensive study of pomaceous fruits — apple, pear, quince;
drupaceous or stone fruits — plum, cherry, peach, nectarine, apricot. Each fruit
studied with reference to the points enumerated under 2, above. Lectures, text-
books, and laboratory work.
9. Forestry. — This course embraces a study of forest trees and their natural uses,
their distribution, and their artificial production. The relations of forest and climate
are studied, and the general topics of forestry legislation and economy are discussed.
10. Landscape gardening. — Ornamental and landscape gardening, with special refer-
ence to the beautifying of home surroundings. Lectures illustrated by means of lan-
tern slides and charts, recitations, reference readings, and practical exercises.
11. Economic botany. — Useful plants and plant products. Lectures and assigned
readings.
12. Evolution of cultivated plants.^— Comprising a study of organic evolution and the
modification of plants by domestication.
13. Viticulture. — A comprehensive study of the grape and its products.
14. Nut culture. — The cultivation and management of nut-bearing trees for com-
mercial purposes.
15. Floriculture. — Amateur and commercial floriculture, including a study of win-
dow gardening, and the growing of cut flowers and decorative plants.
16. General horticulture. — For students not registered in the college of agriculture.
A course covering the general principles and processes of fruit growing, gardening,
floriculture, and ornamental planting.
17. Commercial horticulture. — A course giving practical training for those students
intending to follow horticulture as a business. Work in houses, orchards, and gar-
dens; suited to ability and requirements of each student. Special permission required
for admission into this course.
18. Experimental horticulture. — A course for those intending to engage in professional
horticulture or experiment-station work. For advanced students.
19. Special investigations and thesis work. — Required of candidates for graduation.
446
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
ANIMAL HUSBANDRY.
1. Sheep , mutton, and wool. — The comparative quality and value of mutton cuts;
different grades of wool and their uses in manufactures, together with a critical
examination of animals both for mutton, wool, and breeding purposes. The devel-
opment and characteristics of the several breeds; the most successful methods of
flock masters and the economic production of mutton and wool for the markets of
the world. Lectures, assigned readings, and extensive practice in judging.
2. Swine and their products. — A study of the types and breeds of swine and the
most successful methods of growing and marketing their products. Lectures, assigned
readings, and practice in judging.
4. Market classes, heavy horses. — The horse market; an outline of the types and
classes in demand; special study of the heavy horse; of the uses to which he is put
and of the breeds suitable for his production, together with the best methods of
producing and fitting heavy horses for market. Lectures, assigned readings, and
exhaustive practice in judging.
5. Market classes, light horses. — Coach, carriage, and road horses; bus horses, cab
horses, and saddlers; artillery and cavalry horses; a systematic study of their classes
and types and of the breeds and methods most suitable for their production; also
handling and fitting for market. Lectures, assigned readings, and practice in judging.
7. Principles of stock feeding . — The functional activities of the animal body and the
end products of their metabolism. Foods are considered, first, chemically, as afford-
ing materials for the construction of the body tissues or animal products, as meat,
milk, wool, etc. ; s?cond, dynamically, as supplying the potential energy for the body
processes and for external labor; third, as to the fertilizing value of their residues.
8. Stock breeding. (See Thremmatology 1.)
9. Investigation and thesis. — Upon lines to be arranged with instructor for one or
both semesters, according to nature of the subject.
10. Meat. — The various cuts of beef, mutton, and pork — their comparative food
value, quality, and cost; a critical study of quality and richness in meat; the by-
products of the slaughterhouse and their bearing upon the cost of meat. Lectures,
assigned readings, and demonstrations.
11. Market grades of beef cattle. — An outline of the market types and grades, includ-
ing prime steers, stockers, and feeders. A study of beef type from the standpoint of
the butcher, the feeder, and the breeder. Lectures, assigned readings, and exhaust-
ive practice in judging.
12. Breeds of beef cattle. — The history, development, and characteristics of the
breeds suitable for beef production. Tracing pedigrees, and a critical study of the
same. (This course is intended for students expecting to own or manage pure-bred
herds.) Lectures, assigned readings, and exhaustive practice in judging.
13. Beef production. — Methods and practices in breeding and feeding beef cattle for
the open market. By-products of the feed lot and their bearing upon the cost of
beef. It is recommended that this course should be taken after Animal Husbandry 1.
Lectures, assigned readings, and a study of experimental work.
14. Management of pure-bred herds of beef cattle.— Like Animal Husbandry 3, this
course is intended for students anticipating the management or ownership of regis-
tered herds. The breeding herd, and its housing, feed, and management. The
selection and fitting of animals for sale and for the show ring. Disposal of surplus
stock. Lectures and assigned readings.
15. Dairy cattle. (See Dairy Husbandry 2 and 3. )
16. Stable management and feeding.— Stables; stable floors, fixtures and other equip-
ment, and their care; feeding and care of work horses and drivers at labor and at
rest; care of harness, vehicles, etc. Lectures and reference readings.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
447
17. The education and driving of the horse. — A critical study of the mental qualities,
peculiarities, and limitations of the horse, together with the most successful methods
of educating and training him for skillful work at labor or on the road. The rules
and practices of correct driving, the responsibilities of the driver, and the courtesies
of the public highway. Lectures, readings, and practice.
18. Breeds of light horses. — Their history, development, characteristics, and uses.
Lectures and assigned readings.
19. Breeds of draft horses. — Their history, development, and characteristics. Lec-
tures and assigned readings.
20. Breeding , rearing , and management. — Selection of breeding stock; care and man-
agement of stallions, mares, and foals; buying, selling, and showing. Lectures and
assigned readings.
DAIRY HUSBANDRY.
1. Milk. — The character and composition of normal milk; standardizing milk and
cream; proper precautions to prevent contamination; the care and uses of milk;
practice with the Babcock test and the lactometer, supplemented by lectures and
reference readings and by laboratory experiments upon contamination of milk.
2. Dairy cattle. — The cow as a factor in the economic production of milk, butter,
and cheese; difference in the efficiency of individual animals; establishment of the
dairy herd by selection and grading with pure-bred sires; the principal characteristics
of the dairy cow, with extensive practice in judging; the various breeds adapted to
dairy purposes, their history and characteristics, with practice in judging by both
dairy and breed standards.
3. Dairy-farm management. — Soiling and pasturing dairy cows; crops adapted to the
dairy farm, and best methods of converting these into milk; the place and value
of the silo on the dairy farm and the best methods of handling and feeding silage;
a study of the best and most economical systems of feeding, together with the care
and raising of calves; housing and general care of the herd; arrangement, ventilation,
and care of dairy barn.
4. Cream separation. — A critical study of different systems of cream separation as
to rapidity and efficiency, and the comparison of different machines, especially cen-
trifugal separators; designed to betaken in conjunction with course.
5. Butter making. — Ripening the cream; churning, working, packing, and scoring
the butter; designed to be taken in conjunction with course.
6. Cheese making. — Practice in setting milk, cutting and cooking the curd, and
pressing and curing cheese. One-half of the time will be devoted to the manufacture
of Cheddar cheese and the remainder to fancy cheeses, as Swiss, Edam, Gouda, cot-
tage, etc.
7. Factory management. — Cooperative and company creameries and cheese factories;
planning construction, equipment, and operation of plants, including care of engines,
boilers, and refrigerating machines; a study of the construction and different insula-
tions of creamery refrigerators, both for natural and mechanical means of refrigera-
tion; also practice in pipe cutting and soldering.
8. City milk supply. — Sources of milk, together wdth methods of shipping, handling,
and distributing, and of securing a healthful product for large cities.
9. Comparative dairying. — A study of the dairy systems and practice of different
countries, including the care and management of dairy cattle. The principal dairy
products of the different countries and the methods of handling and sale, particularly
the preparation ofpmilk for direct consumption. The more important conditions,
historical and present, and local and inherited influences affecting dairy practices.
Recitations, reference readings, and illustrated lectures.
10. Dairy husbandry , minor. — A study of the composition and variations of milk,
448
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
detection of adulterations by means of the Babcock test and lactometer; standardiz-
ing milk and cream; methods of detection of impure and unwholesome milk; where
and to what extent milk becomes contaminated, and methods of prevention; scoring
butter and cheese. This course is required for graduation of all students in agricul-
ture who do not take more extended courses in dairy husbandry.
11. Dairy bacteriology. — A careful study of the distribution of bacteria as deter-
mined by a bacteriological analysis of air in the open field, dairy rooms, and dairy
barns under different conditions, showing where and to what extent milk may
become contaminated through the air and from the cow during process of milking
and subsequently; also how this contamination may be largely avoided by proper
methods. The effect of bacteria on milk and on the rapidity with which it sours
after being produced under different degrees of cleanliness and held at different
temperatures. The part that bacteria play in the ripening of cream and making of
butter and in the manufacture and ripening of cheese.
12. Investigation and thesis.— Subject arranged with instructor.
13. Fancy products. — The manufacture of koumiss and primost and of different
grades of ice cream. A study of the modifications of milk.
THREMMATOLOGY.
1. Applied evolution. — The principles of evolution as applied to the improvement of
domesticated animals and plants. Variation, its extent and causes. Selection, and
its effect in changing type, as illustrated both in nature and in domestication. The
nature of heredity and the manner of its operation under the influence of environ-
ment. Reflex action, habit, and instinct, as bearing upon the question of the
inheritance of acquired characters. The origin, correlation, and disappearance of
characters. The laws of frequency and regression as bearing upon achievements
that may be confidently expected.
2. Investigation and thesis.
VETERINARY SCIENCE.
1. Anatomy and physiology. — The anatomy and physiology of the domestic animals,
diseases of the bony structure, and lameness. The instruction is given by lectures,
aided by demonstrations with use of skeletons and of other apparatus, as follows:
Dr. Auzoux’s complete model of the horse, which is in 97 pieces and exhibits 3,000
details of structure; papier-mache model of the horse’s foot, the teeth of the horse,
and dissections of animals. This work is supplemented with the study of text-
books.
2. Veterinary materia medica. — This subject, which treats of the agents for the cure
of disease or injury, and for the preservation of health among domestic animals, is
taught by lectures and text-books, illustrated by specimens of the drugs used in vet-
erinary practice. The compounding of medicines also receives attention.
3. Theory and practice of veterinary medicine and surgery. — This subject is taught by
lectures and text-books on the diseases of domestic animals, and is illustrated with
specimens of morbid anatomy and by observations and practice at the free clinics.
The latter are held at the veterinary infirmary once a week. The students assist in
the operations, and thus obtain a practical knowledge of the subject. Dissections
and post-mortem examinations are made as cases present themselves.
SECONDARY EDUCATION IN AGRICULTURE.
The movement for the establishment of secondary courses of instruc-
tion in agiiculture has received a new impetus from the action of the
State of Wisconsin in providing’ for the establishment of county agrri-
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
449
cultural high schools. An account of the movement for the establish-
ment of these schools in Wisconsin is given in the following paper by
Prof. W. A. Henry, dean of the College of Agriculture of the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin:
SECONDARY AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION IN WISCONSIN.
The recent action of the Dunn County and the Marathon County boards in pro-
viding county agricultural schools is of such unusual importance to this Common-
wealth that due cognizance should be taken of the same by all good citizens interested
in educational advancement. The beginning of this movement reaches back many
years. Sixteen years ago the regents of the University of Wisconsin becoming dis-
satisfied with the small attendance of bona fide agricultural students at the univer-
sity, appointed a committee to consider the best means of bringing about a change.
As chairman of that committee William F, Vilas prepared a report which was
adopted by the board, and resulted in the establishment of what is now known as the
short course in agriculture. The object of this course was to take young men directly
from the farm and give them intensely practical training in agricultural lines, and
then return them to the farm to make use of what they might have learned at the
university. From an insignificant beginning this course of instruction has grown
until it now has crowded the university accommodations to the utmost, with inabil-
ity to accommodate all who seek instruction in some lines. To shut out nonresident
attendance, the fees have been made practically prohibitory to those coming from
other States.
Thoughtful educators and others interested in the intellectual development of our
State have for some time past been impressed with the fact that it was simply out of
the question for the university to attempt to provide instruction in elementary agri-
culture for all that needed such instruction, or even for those who might come to the
university for that purpose. Thousands of young men should receive such training
annually, and such numbers could not be accommodated at any one central point
without incurring expense for such instruction entirely beyond the powers of the
State to meet. Moreover, it is the function of the university to impart the highest
form of instruction rather than to undertake elementary work in educational lines.
Up to the present time there has been no place aside from the university where the
young farmer could gain any training helpful in preparing himself for his future
vocation. The city schools do uot provide suitable training in many particulars for
those who intend to live upon the farm. Urban educational effort is along urban
lines toward urban conditions, and does rot recognize in any way the vast fund of
useful knowledge relating to the country and to country life. The farmer boy
attending the village or city high school is being educated away from the farm rather
than toward the farm, with all its possibilities for a useful life. To meet the wants
of the large number of rural young folk who desire to secure some higher education
than is afforded by the district school, and yet desire to keep in touch with farm life
and farm conditions, some form of secondary agricultural schools seems imperative.
To understand the subject historically in Wisconsin, it is necessary at this point to
take up another line of educational effort. We have in our State seven normal
schools, with an attendance of about 2,200 pupils. Great as is this number, it is
unfortunate to report that the graduates of these schools have not to any extent gone
into the rural schools as teachers. Even those who leave the normal schools before
graduation do not supply in any large measure the demands for trained teachers made
by the country schools. As a consequence the 5,000 rural schools in Wisconsin have
been largely without specially trained teachers in the past. There recently arose
the thought of establishing county training schools for teachers, and the Wisconsin
s. Doc. 10rt 29
450
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
legislature of 1899 enacted a law permitting two counties, but not more, to found
county training schools for teachers and provided that if these fulfilled certain
requirements they should each be allowed to draw $1,250 annually from the State
treasury. Marathon and Dunn counties were the first to apply for the benefits of this
act and thereby secured the State appropriation. From their inception these schools
have been a success in training teachers who afterwards teach in the country district
schools. So pleased was the State at the success of the two-county training schools
for teachers that the legislature of 1901 doubled the State allowance, making it $2,500
annually to each school, and authorized the establishment of four additional county
training schools for teachers, making the number allotted six in all. Six such schools
are now in operation. The legislature of 1901 further provided that after that year
all school-teachers should be examined in the elements of agriculture.
The reader who may have followed this presentation thus far will readily see how
naturally and easily the next step in our educational development has been taken.
The overcrowded condition of the college of agriculture at the university in its
elementary work, the wonderful success of the novel idea of county normal schools
for rural teachers and the requirements of examination of all teachers in the elements
of agriculture have brought us forward to a point where a further move is essential
to the rounding out of a rational system of education for our Commonwealth.
In December, 1898, State Superintendent L. D. Harvey, in a paper before the State
Teachers’ Association in Milwaukee, brought to the attention of educators the sub-
ject of county agricultural schools. The legislature of 1899 directed the superin-
tendent of public instruction to investigate and report upon the methods of instruction
in manual training and the theory and art of agriculture in other countries and States.
Superintendent Harvey’s report on this matter covers 83 pages of interesting data.
Everything was now ready for the final move, which was made without serious
difficulty, there being a surprising agreement of our legislators as to its necessity and
expediency. Superintendent Harvey prepared a bill providing for the establishment
of county schools of agriculture and domestic science. A digest of the law (chapter
288, Laws of 1901) is as follows:
Section 1. The county board of any county is authorized to establish and maintain
“ a county school of agriculture and domestic economy.”
Section 2 provides for a county school board to control such school.
Sections 3 and 4 provide for two counties to unite in a joint agricultural school.
Section 5 makes the county treasurer the ex-officio treasurer of the board.
Section 6. In all county schools of agriculture and domestic economy organized
under the provisions of this act, instruction shall be given in the elements of agri-
culture, including instruction concerning the soil, plant life, and the animal life of
the farm; a system of farm accounts shall also be taught; instruction shall also be
given in manual training and domestic economy, and such other subjects as may be
prescribed.
Section 7. Each such school shall have connected with it a tract of land suitable
for purposes of experiment and demonstration, and not less than 3 acres in area.
Section 8. The schools organized under the provisions of this act shall be free to
inhabitants of the county or counties contributing to their support, who shall be
qualified to pursue this course of study, provided they shall have at least the quali-
fications required for completion of the course of study for common schools. When-
ever students of advanced age desire admission to the school during the winter
months in sufficient number to warrant the organization of special classes for their
instruction such classes shall be organized and continued for such time as their
attendance may make necessary.
Section 9 provides that the State superintendent shall render assistance, and, “with
the advice of the dean of the college of agriculture of the State University,” he shall
prescribe the courses of study to be pursued and determine the qualifications required
of the teachers employed in such schools.
Senate Doc. No. 104.
Plate XLIII.
Fig. 1 .—Agricultural Education— New Main Building of the Marathon County
School of Agriculture and Domestic Economy.
Fig. 2.— Agricultural Education— New Main Building of the Dunn County
School of Agriculture and Domestic Economy.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.
451
Section 10 provides that a school complying with the provisions of the law may be
placed on the approved list of county schools of agriculture and domestic economy.
The secretary of such school shall report annually the condition of the school to the
State superintendent, setting forth the cost of the school, character of the work done,
number of teachers employed, etc. If the State superintendent is satisfied that the
school is up to grade, he shall certify the same to the secretary of state, who shall pay
over to such school a sum equal to one-half the amount actually expended for
instruction in such school, provided that the total amount so expended shall not
exceed $5,000 in any one year. But two schools can draw State aid under this act.
This allows a sum not exceeding $2,500 to be turned over by the State to each of
the two county schools allowed under this act.
Marathon and Dunn, the two counties which were first to nave county teachers’
training schools under the law of 1899, are the first to avail themselves of the law
above summarized. When it is known that both these counties are located in the
newer parts of our State, it will be realized that “push and progress ” is the watch-
word of these ambitious people. Having learned from direct observation the merits
of county normal schools, these counties have gone a step further and completed
their educational system by arranging for county schools of agriculture and domestic
economy.
The Marathon County School of Agriculture and Domestic Economy, located at
Wausau, Wis., was opened October 6, 1902. (PI. XL1II, fig. 1) The buildings and
equipment provided for this school cost $20,000. The school grounds cover 6 acres.
The course of study for boys includes soils, plants, animal husbandry, rural archi-
tecture, blacksmith ing, carpentry, and mechanical drawing. The course of study for
girls includes cooking, laundering, sewing, floriculture, and home management and
decoration. Both courses include English language and literature, United States
history, civil government, and commercial arithmetic with farm accounts. Tuition
is free to students living in Marathon County. The cost of board and rooms runs
from $2.50 to $3. On November 26, 1902, this school was reported to have 62 stu-
dents — 15 boys and 47 girls. The average age of the students was 16 years. The
principal of the school is R. B. Johns, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin.
The Dunn County School of Agriculture and Domestic Science is located at Menom-
onie. (PI. XLIII, fig 2.) This school is centrally located in the county and is
equipped with a fine brick main building, erected by the county at a cost of $16,000,
for the joint use of this school and the county teachers’ training school, and a frame
building for shop work, which, with grounds surrounding the school, cost $5,000.
The farm work is done on the county asylum farm 1 mile distant from the school.
The course of study for boys includes instruction regarding soils, fertilizers, plant
life, horticulture, field crops, animal husbandry, dairying, poultry, economic insects,
farm accounts, blacksmithing and other metal work, carpentry, and rural architecture.
The course of study for girls includes work in sewing, cooking, home economy and
management, drawing and designing, domestic hygiene, chemistry of foods, dairy-
ing, poultry, farm accounts, and horticulture.
Both courses include studies in United States history, civil government, library
readings, English, and elementary science.
Only two years will be required to complete the full course for either boys or girls,
and shorter courses may \>e pursued.
Tuition is free to students living in Dunn County. Others will pay $25 per year,
except that the first ten students from other counties will be admitted for the first
year on the payment of only $10 each.
Students may find board and rooms in private families in Menomonie at prices
ranging from $2.25 to $3.75 per week. Students can board themselves for about $2
per week.
The school opened October 20, 1902, and by December 44 students had registered —
32 boys and 12 girls — of an average age of 18? years. This number has since
452
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
increased. They are from country schools, with few exceptions. The principal of
the school is Dr. K. C. Davis, a graduate of the Kansas Agricultural College and
recently horticulturist at the West Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station.
State Superintendent Harvey, who has watched both these efforts from the begin-
ning, and to whose credit the conception of the county agricultural schools in Wis-
consin must ever stand, states that there will be required in the county training
school for teachers 2 teachers and in the county agricultural school 3 teachers as a
minimum. In the agricultural school there will be needed 1 principal, who will
teach branches of agriculture, 1 teacher of manual training, 1 teacher of domestic
economy. Each will teach some academic branch in addition.
As all teachers in the rural schools must now pass examination in the elements of
agriculture, it will be seen that the union of these two branches of education in one
school is a wise one. Mr. Harvey states that pupils from the rural schools who have
completed the course of study provided for such schools will doubtless be admitted
to these agricultural schools; that their training here should be covered in a two
years’ course.
If the experiments in Dunn and Marathon counties prove successful, no doubt
other counties will likewise establish county agricultural schools, and the system
will gradually spread over the State. The wisdom of experimenting with the county
training school system by allowing only two schools at first and later following along
the same lines for agricultural schools is to be highly commended. The State is
experimenting along the best lines of educational effort, and the people are gradually
being educated to new and important changes, which, if wrought too suddenly, might
bring dissatisfaction and revulsion.
If the system of county agricultural schools shall gradually extend over the State,
the time is not far distant when there can be a material rise in the grade of scholar-
ship required for the admission of short-course students to the university. When
this comes about, the university will receive graduates from the county agricultural
schools and give to such advanced agricultural training. It will relegate to the
county schools much of the elementary work which it is now doing. Among its
other functions, it will prepare teachers for the county agricultural schools and give
to such young men as wish a higher degree of agricultural training than they can
secure in the county schools.
The farmers’ sons and daughters will now have near at home schools specially
devoted to their interests, helpful to them in their future farm life. In the judgment
of the writer, the addition of county training schools for teachers and county agricul-
tural schools rounds out our educational system in Wisconsin in a symmetrical and
complete manner. No class of people or interests in the State are longer left uncared
for educationally. City children are educated in their way for the city, and country
children are educated for country life. Much remains, of course, to be done in the
way of perfecting the system, but the main lines are now properly laid. Wisconsin
is the first State in the Union to provide for secondary agricultural education by a
system of county schools specially designed to meet the needs of farmers’ sons and
daughters.
AGRICULTURAL COURSES IN TOWN HIGH SCHOOLS.
To aid in the movement for the organization of secondary courses
in agriculture, the committee on methods of teaching agriculture of
the Association of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment
Stations made a report on this subject to the convention of the associa-
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 453
tion, held at Atlanta, Ga., in October, 1902. That portion of this
report which relates to the public high schools is given below:
In addition to provision for instruction in agriculture in connection with the col-
leges and in special agricultural high schools the teaching of agriculture should be
introduced into the public high schools in or near the rural communities. There
are many villages and cities in the United States which are dependent on the farms
surrounding them for their commercial prosperity, if not for their very existence.
The high schools maintained in these places draw their students largely from the
farms. There is good reason why communities of this kind should seek through
their schools to promote the interests of the industry to which they owe so much.
They should at least cooperate with the surrounding rural communities to secure for
the farmers’ children technical education in agriculture parallel to the education in
commercial business and mechanic arts which many of the city high schools are
now offering to their students.
As previously stated, the high-school system of the United States has been rapidly
developed in the past few years in the direction of broadening the courses in natural
science and industrial arts and in the provision for numerous elective courses in
these and other subjects. While it continues to supply college preparatory courses
for the limited number of students intending to pursue their school career beyond
the high school, its chief business is to educate the nine out of every ten of its students
who are to step from its halls into active life. In our largest and wealthiest cities
this change of aim of the high school has led to the establishment not only of numer-
ous courses in the classics, modern languages, natural sciences, mathematics, history,
and political economy, but also of separate high schools with elaborate courses in
business forms and mechanic arts. The smaller cities are striving to follow in the
same path as far as their means will permit.
Agriculture has thus far been almost entirely neglected in the high-school pro-
grammes, and it is high time that the friends of agricultural education should make
a systematic effort to have the claims of this fundamental industry acknowledged
and satisfied in the curricula of the public high schools. Since successful agriculture
is essential to the prosperity and well-being of urban as well as rural communities,
there should be cooperation between country districts, villages, cities, and the States
to provide the means for the maintenance of agricultural courses in the high schools.
As a practical measure it is believed that such courses may be added to those already
existing in many high schools by the addition of a single teacher, who should be an
agricultural college graduate, to the teaching force already supplied. The expense
of maintaining this teacher and his equipment may properly be shared by the State,
the village, or city maintaining the high school, and the country district from which
the pupils from the farms are drawn to this school. The State may properly aid this
movement by offering a stated sum annually to high schools maintaining agricultural
courses. Already many small townships are paying the tuition of pupils attending
high schools in neighboring townships, and this system should be extended with
the proviso that such tuition fees paid for students desiring agricultural courses
should be devoted to the maintenance of agricultural courses. The balance neces-
sary to maintain these courses will, it is believed, be cheerfully paid by the villages
or cities maintaining the high schools as soon as they realize that such expenditure
is in the nature of an investment, the returns from which in the way of better and
more abundant agricultural products will be certain and remunerative.
In order that it may be apparent that agricultural courses may be offered in the
high schools without any violent or radical reorganization of existing programmes
454
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
for such schools, a number of tentative schedules for such courses are presented here-
with along with various courses already existing in high schools in different parts of
the country. An examination of numerous high-school programmes has revealed a
very great variety in their courses as regards the number of different branches and
the amount of time devoted to each branch in any particular course. In general,
however, it may be said that the average high-school course in this country presup-
poses that the student has had an eight-year course in a primary school, where he
has been taught reading, writing, spelling, arithmetic, elements of English grammar
and composition, geography, and United States history. The best primary schools
also give some instruction in drawing, music, nature study, and woodworking, or
sewing and cooking.
The high-school course covers four years and will ordinarily embrace instruction
in algebra, geometry, ancient and modern history, English, drawing, and music,
together with various combinations of Latin, Greek, French, German, and the ele-
ments of natural sciences (especially chemistry, physics, and botany). Whenever
the manual arts or the natural sciences are largely introduced into high-school
courses the practical effect is to reduce the amount of time given to the ancient and
modern languages. With improved instruction in English and science the effect of
this on the general training of the student is not as marked as it might otherwise be,
and whatever the theoretical pedagogical value of instruction in ancient or modern
languages, there is little doubt that when a choice has to be made between these
subjects and those which relate directly to the pursuit by which the pupil is to gain
his livelihood, it will in most cases be desirable that he shall choose the things
of most direct benefit in his life work. That it will not always be necessary for
the student of agriculture to entirely neglect the study of at least one ancient or
modern language in this high-school course, provided his tastes or attainments lead
him in that direction, may be seen from examination of the programmes of courses
presented herewith.
With the introduction of agriculture into the high-school course, it is presumed
that the courses in physics, chemistry, botany, and zoology will be so shaped as to
form an appropriate introduction to the more formal instruction in the different
branches of agriculture, i. e., agronomy, zootechny, dairying, rural engineering, and
rural economy. As indicated in previous reports of this committee, we would include
under agronomy whatever is taught regarding climate, soils, fertilizers, and the bot-
any, varieties, culture, harvesting, preservation, uses, and enemies of farm crops;
under zootechny, the theory and practice of animal production, including the breed-
ing, feeding, hygiene, and management of farm animals; under dairying, the princi-
ples and methods involved in the handling and sale of milk for consumption and in
the making of butter and cheese; under, rural engineering, principles and methods
involved in the laying out of farms, and the construction and use of farm buildings,
systems for water supply, irrigation, drainage, sewerage, roads, and machinery; under
rural economy, the history of agriculture, capital, labor systems, cost of production,
marketing, records, accounts, etc., as related to farm management.
Beginning with the simpler forms of high-school courses, we present a programme
prepared under direction of the State superintendent of public instruction in Indiana
and recommended for use in that State in high schools where at least two teachers
are employed exclusively in high-school work, and along with this a tentative agri-
cultural course prepared by your committee, which presupposes an additional teacher.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION
455
Programme for high schools in Indiana. a
FIRST YEAR.
General course.
Tentative agricultural course.
Algebra 5
English 5
Latin 5
Physics or chemistry 5
English 5
Algebra 5
Plants and their cultivation (i. e., botany-
general and economic) S
Physics 5
SECOND YEAR.
Algebra (one-third year)...
Geometry (two-thirds year)
English
Latin
History
5 English S
5 Algebra \ c
5 Geometry f
5 Animals and their management (i. e., zo-
5 ology — general and economic) 5
Chemistry 5
THIRD YEAR.
Geometry (two-thirds year)
Elective b (one-third year) .
English
History
5 English &
5 Geometry, Latin, or German &
5 Agronomy (with special attention to local
5 crops)
History &
FOURTH YEAR.
Elective & 5
Zoology or botany 5
Latin 5
History 5
History 5
Political economy 5
Zootechny and dairying 5
Latin or German 5
a With each subject the number of recitation periods per week is given.
b Mathematics, physical geography, oratory, or advanced physiology.
With the introduction of agriculture into high schools of this kind the division of
studies among three teachers might be as follows:
A.
B.
C.
English.
Chemistry.
Physics.
Latin.
Botany.
Mathematics.
German.
Zoology.
Agriculture.
History.
Political economy.
Teacher B should be an agricultural college graduate and would ordinarily be a man who might
be principal of the school. Teachers A and C would ordinarily be women.
As an example of a high school in a city of medium size, that of Lowell, Mass,
(population, 95,000; chief industry, cotton manufacturing), has been selected.
Eight courses are offered, but only the classical, modern language, and manual-
training courses, recommended as general training courses, are given herewith.
Studies in italics are elective.
456
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS,
Programme of Lowell ( Mass . ) High School. a
FIRST YEAR.
Classical course.
Modern-language
course.
Manual-training course.
Tentative agricultural
course.
English 5
Algebra 5
Latin 5
Physical geography 2\
English 5
Latin 5
Algebra 5
Physical geography. 2|
English 5
Algebra 5
Manual training .. 5
Physical geography. 2£
English 5
Algebra 5
Plants and their
cultivation (i. e.,
botany— general
and economic) ... 5
Physics 2£
SECOND YEAR.
History and Eng-
History and Eng-
History and Eng-
History and Eng-
lish : 5
lish 5
lish B
lish 5
Geometry 5
Physics 5
Manual training . . 5
Animals and their
Physics 5
Geometry 5
Geometry 5
management
Latin or French 5
French 5
Physics 5
French 5
(i. e., zoology —
general and eco-
nomic) 5
Cheyiistry 5
Geometry 5
French or German or
Latin c 5
THIRD YEAR.
History and Eng-
lish 5
Arithmetic 2|
Physiology 2i
Chemistry 2\
German 5
Latin 5
Astronomy and ge-
ology b 5
History and Eng-
lish 5
Arithmetic 2£
Physiology 2|
Chemistry 2\
German 5
French.. i 5
Astronomy and ge-
ology b 5
History and Eng-
lish 5
Manual training . . 5
Arithmetic 2i
Physiology 2|
Chemistry 5
German 5
French 5
Astronomy and ge-
ology b 5
History and Eng-
lish 5
Agronomy and ru-
ral engin eering ... 5
Arithmetic 2£
Physiology 2£
Chemistry 5
French or German or
Latin c 5
Astronomy and ge-
ology b 5
FOURTH YEAR.
English
.... 5
English
.... 5
English
5
English
5
History
.... 5
History
.... 5
Manual training. . .
5
Zootechny and
Chemistry
.... 5
Chemistry
.... 5
History
5
dairying
5
German
.... 5
German
.... 5
Chemistry
5
History
5
Latin
.... 5
Botany
.... 2h
German
5
Rural economy and
Botany
.... 2 |
French
5
farm management.
2*
Geometry and trig-
Entomology
2^
onometry
5
Trigonometry and
surveying
French or German or
5
Latin c
5
a With each subject the number of recitation periods per week is given.
bMay be taken the fourth year instead of the third:
c Whatever language is elected should be continued through at least two years.
Another example of a high school in a city of medium size has been selected, viz,
Des Moines, Iowa (population, 62,000), which is in the midst of a rich agricultural
district. This illustrates a course of study in which the elective system predominates.
By simply adding to the curriculum for the second, third, and fourth years electives
in agriculture a course of study much better adapted to the needs of pupils from
the rural districts could be arranged.
RECENT PBOGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION. 457
Programme of Des Moines (Iowa) High School. a
FIRST YEAR.
Present course of study.
Algebra
Zoology
English
Drawing
Botany
Latin
Phgsical geography.
Geology
Tentative agricultural course.
5
2 *
3
2
2$
5
2s
2j
Algebra
Zoology
English
Drawing
Botany
Latin
Physical geography
Geology
5
2i
3
2
2 *
5
2s
2 *
SECOND YEAR.
Algebra
Geometry
English
History
Physiology
Latin
Bookkeeping and commercial law.
•*s
2s
5
2j
5
5
Algebra
Geometry
English
History
Physiology
Plants and their cultivation (i. e., botany —
general and economic)
Animals andtheir management (i. e., zoology —
general and economic)
Latin ^
Bookkeeping and commercial law
2*
2 *
2*
5
2s
2s
2i
5
5
THIRD YEAR.
Geometry 5
English 5
Latin 5
Greek 5
German 5
French 5
Chemistry 5
Civics and economics 5
English history 2|
American history 5
Geometry 5
English 5
Agronomy and rural engineering 5
Latin 5
Greek 5
German 5
French 5
Chemistry 5
Civics and economics 5
English history 2£
American history 5
FOURTH YEAR.
Physics 5
English 5
Latin 5
Greek 5
German 5
French 5
Civics and economics 5
American history 5
Trigonometry 2\
Astronomy 2£
Physics 5
English 5
Zootechny and dairying 5
Rural economy and farm management 2£
Latin 5
Greek 5
German 5
French 5
Civics and economics 5
American history 5
Trigonometry 2s
Astronomy 2£
a With each subject the number of recitation periods per week is given. Each pupil must take
studies occupying at least 15 periods in addition to English. Subjects in italics are elective.
As an example of a high school in a large city, that of Washington, D. C. (popu-
lation 279,000), has been selected. In this city there are also- business and manual-
training high schools with elaborate special courses. For our present purpose the
tentative agricultural course is compared with the courses offered in the general
high school.
458
REPORT OF OFFICE OF EXPERIMENT STATIONS.
Programme of Washington High School. a
FIRST YEAR.
Academic course.
Scientific course.
Tentative agricultural course.
English 5
History 5
Algebra 5
Latin 5
Drawing
English 5
History 5
Algebra 5
German 5
Drawing
English 5
Algebra 5
Plants and their cultivation
(i. e., botany — general and
economic) 5
Physics 5
Drawing or woodworking. .
SECOND YEAR.
English \ -
English history j
Greek 5
Geometry 5
Latin 5
Physics or chemistry 5
Drawing
English 1 c
English history j
Geometry 5
German or French 5
Physics or chemistry 5
Drawing
English f>
Geometry 5
Animals and their manage-
ment (i. e., zoology — gen-
eral and economic) 5
Chemistry 5
Drawing or woodworking..
THIRD YEAR.
English 5
Latin 5
French 5
German 5
Greek 5
Biology, or advanced chem-
istry, or advanced physics . 5
Political economy 5
Solid geometry 5
Trigonometry and surveying,
or history 5
English 5
German or French 5
Biology, or advanced chem-
istry, or advanced physics . . 5
French 5
Political economy 5
Solid geometry 5
Trigonometry and surveying,
or history 5
English 5
History 5
Agronomy and rural engi-
neering 5
Biology 5
Trigonometry and survey-
ing 5
Latin 5
German 5
Bookkeeping 5
Drawing 5
FOURTH YEAR.
English 5
Latin 5
Advanced biology, or chem-
istry, or physics 5
Greek 5
History, or analytical ge-
ometry and college algebra . 5
French 5
German 5
Spanish 5
English 5
German or French 5
Advanced biology, or chem-
istry, or physics 5
History, or analytical geome-
try and college algebra 5
French 5
Spanish 5
English 3
Political economy 5
Zootechny and dairying 5
Rural economics and farm
management 2
History 5
Latin 5
German 5
Drawing 5
Bookkeeping 5
Entomology 5
ttWith each subject the number of recitation periods per week is given. Each candidate fora
diploma must take studies occupying at least 20 periods, except in the fourth year, when the minimum
requirement is 18 periods. Subjects in italics are elective.
It is believed that the presentation of schedules as above justifies the assertion that
it is entirely practicable to adjust an agricultural course of high-school grade to
existing high-school schedules and to make this agricultural course fairly satisfactory
for the purposes of general training, as well as elementary instruction in the theory
and practice of agriculture. The graduate of such an agricultural course may fairly
be expected to understand the scientific basis of improved agriculture and to have an
intelligent appreciation of the needs of a progressive agriculture. He will then be in
position to profit by the results of the investigations of the experiment stations and
by the information regarding the progress of his art which may come to him from
the njore intelligent of his neighbors, farmers’ institutes, and good books and jour-
nals. He will be likely to become an intelligent and progressive farmer as well as a
refined and useful citizen and home-maker.
RECENT PROGRESS IN AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION
459
In the present condition of secondary education in this country there is no room
for dogmatism regarding courses of study, but there is every reason why the friends
of agricultural education should assert their right to be heard in claiming the
importance, desirability, and feasibility of including instruction in agricultural sub-
jects in high-school programmes. Your committee has proceeded on the assumption
that the definite formulation of tentative secondary courses in agriculture would con-
tribute to the more intelligent discussion of this important subject. If continued, it
may hereafter give more attention to this subject and report such further suggestions
as more extended study may bring out.
A. C. True,
T. F. Hunt,
H. T. French,
H. H. Wing,
Committee .
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