The notable development of the university College of Agriculture at St. Anthony Park cannot here have adequate room, but mention must be made of one of its auxiliaries, the so-called “School of Agriculture.” From the year 1868, when the agricultural college lands were merged with those of the university, the regents and faculty of the university had exerted themselves in all good faith to gather students into the agricultural college which they had promptly organized on paper. The farmers’ boys flocked to the university, not to learn agriculture but to practice it. Only occasionally could any be induced to enroll in that college. Up to 1888 not fifty had so done, and but one had completed the course and been graduated. The first president had declared that there was no proper work for an agricultural “college” to do, and that agricultural schools of secondary rank must be organized. Professor Edward A. Porter of the university department of agriculture, after some years of experiment and reflection, became convinced that such a school should be undertaken, and that, not on the university campus, but on the experimental farm some two miles away. He brought the board of regents to his opinion through the influence of an “advisory board of farmers” which he induced them to appoint. State Superintendent D. L. Kiehle, a member of the board of regents _ex-officio_, worked out the pedagogical details, and early in 1888 submitted the plan of a “school” of agriculture to receive students of fifteen and over, with a common-school training, for a term extending from November to April. His idea was to make the instruction practical in the branches immediately related to agriculture, cultivating powers of observation and judgment, and arousing interest in and taste for country life. The school was opened October 18, 1888, with forty-seven students. Young women were admitted in 1897, and a second-year course has been added. The school expenses proper do not exceed eighty-five dollars a year. The enrollment of students for 1908 was 581, and the whole number since 1888 is 4608. A notable fact is that this “school” has stimulated and fed the “college” of agriculture, 69 students having been graduated since the opening of the school. The framers of the “Morrill bill” of 1857-62, granting public lands for the endowment and support of colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts, could have had no expectation of any such use of the grant, and doubtless would have provided against devoting it to elementary education. The industrial education had yet to be invented for this country. But this school of agriculture is far better for the practical farmer than any college could be.
Security Journal
Minnesota — Part 161
2026-11-15 11:38:15 · The Daily Ledger
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