The Grand Old Man Of Purdue University And Indiana Agriculture

William Carol Latta was the 13th member of the Purdue faculty. He became the driving force behind Purdue's world-famous School of Agriculture and initiated extension services that have lasted for more than a century. In 1890, he laid out the first permanent soil fertility field experiments, inaugurating a system of research considered one of the best in the country at that time. He administered Purdue's School of Agriculture until 1907.

The annual festival, or fair, dates back to ancient times with the Mesopotamians, Indians and Greeks. During the Middle Ages the fair evolved into a combination religious and market event with merchants selling exotic goods from faraway places as well as local farmers selling their produce. The Modern Agricultural 4-H County Fair emerged when Massachusetts resident Elkanah Watson needed an event to show his prize sheep. Watson became an early advocate for agricultural fairs as educational venues for farmers. The county extension service grew out of this need for agricultural education. agricultural, education, county, extension

The key role that farming plays in the economy of Indiana today owes much to the work of John Harrison Skinner (1874-1942). Skinner was a pioneering educator and administrator who transformed the study of agriculture at Purdue University during the first decades of the twentieth century. From humble origins, occupying one building and 150 acres at the start of his career, the agriculture program grew to spread over ten buildings and 1,000 acres by the end of his tenure as its first dean. A focused, single-minded man, Skinner understood from his own background as a grain and stock farmer that growers could no longer rely on traditional methods in adapting to a rapidly changing technological and economic environment, in which tractors were replacing horses and new crops such as alfalfa and soy were transforming the arable landscape. Farmers needed education, and only by hiring the best and brightest faculty could Purdue give them the competitive edge that they needed. While he excelled as a manager and advocate for Indiana agriculture, Skinner never lost touch with his own farming roots, taking especial interest in animal husbandry. During the course of his career as dean (1907-1939), the number of livestock on Purdue farms increased fourfold, and Skinner showed his knowledge of breeding by winning many times at the International Livestock Exposition. Today, the scale of Purdue's College of Agriculture has increased to offer almost fifty programs to hundreds of students from all over the globe. However, at its base, the agricultural program in place today remains largely as John Harrison Skinner built it, responsive to Indiana but with its focus always on scientific innovation in the larger world.

Today, Purdue Extension delivers practical, research-based information that transforms lives and livelihoods. Tailored to the needs of Indiana, its current programs include Agriculture and Natural Resources, Health and Human Sciences, Economic and Community Development, and 4-H Youth Development. However, today's success is built on over a century of visionary hard work and outreach. Scattering the Seeds of Knowledge: The Words and Works of Indiana's Pioneer County Extension Agents chronicles the tales of the first county Extension agents, from 1912 to 1939. Their story brings readers back to a day when Extension was little more than words on paper, when county agents traveled the muddy back roads, stopping at each farm, introducing themselves to the farmer and his family. These Extension women and men had great confidence in the research and the best practices they represented, and a commanding knowledge of the inner workings of farms and rural residents. Most importantly, however, they had a knack with people. In many cases they were given the cold shoulder at first by the farmers they were sent to help. However, through old-fashioned, can-do perseverance and a dogged determination to make a difference in the lives of people, these county Extension agents slowly inched the state forward one farmer at a time. Their story is a history lesson on what agriculture was like at the turn of the twentieth century, and a lesson to us all about how patient outreach and dedicated engagement-backed by proven science from university research-reshaped and modernized Indiana agriculture.

America’s schools are constantly in the news today for safety concerns, contested curricula, teacher quality, test scores, and a variety of other topics. Although most people spend at least 12 years in school systems, they know little of the history or evolution of American schooling. The collection of papers assembled in this book are divided into three categories which greatly impacted American schooling: people, policy, and practices. This work seeks to shed light on what has occurred in curriculum history in the past so as to help readers develop a deeper understanding of how our system of schooling arrived at its current state. The first section of the book examines the stories of people who had an influence on schooling and education. The second section focuses on the curricula and programs that were utilized in schools and districts throughout the country. The final chapter of the book looks at decisions that had long-ranging impact on educational policies. The chapters of this book offer a glimpse into the history of American schooling and those people, policies, and practices that influenced its development. It is the editors’ hope that the work will spark interest in scholars and students of educational history to examine other past, as well as present, stories of educators to expand our understanding of the saga that is the American schooling experience.

How the Chicago International Livestock Exposition leveraged the eugenics movement to transform animals into machines and industrialize American agriculture. In 1900, the Chicago International Livestock Exposition became the epicenter of agricultural reform that focused on reinventing animals' bodies to fit a modern, industrial design. Chicago meatpackers partnered with land-grant university professors to create the International—a spectacle on the scale of a world's fair—with the intention of setting the standard for animal quality and, in doing so, transformed American agriculture. In Making Machines of Animals, Neal A. Knapp explains the motivations of both the meatpackers and the professors, describing how they deployed the International to redefine animality itself. Both professors and packers hoped to replace so-called scrub livestock with "improved" animals and created a new taxonomy of animal quality based on the burgeoning eugenics movement. The International created novel definitions of animal superiority and codified new norms, resulting in a dramatic shift in animal weight, body size, and market age. These changes transformed the animals from multipurpose to single-purpose products. These standardized animals and their dependence on off-the-farm inputs and exchanges limited farmers' choices regarding husbandry and marketing, ultimately undermining any goals for balanced farming or the maintenance and regeneration of soil fertility. Drawing on land-grant university research and publications, meatpacker records and propaganda, and newspaper and agricultural journal articles, Knapp critiques the supposed market-oriented, efficiency-driven industrial reforms proffered by the International, which were underpinned by irrational, racist ideologies. The livestock reform movement not only resulted in cruel and violent outcomes for animals but also led to twentieth-century crops and animal husbandry that were rife with inefficiencies and agricultural vulnerabilities.

Virginia Claypool Meredith's role in directly managing the affairs of a large and prosperous farm in east-central Indiana opened doors that were often closed to women in late 19th-century America, and outside her work in agriculture she was a champion for the advancement of women.