182 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



LECTURES GIVEN AT MOKE TUAN ONE INSTITUTE. 



MANUAL LABOR AT THE MICHIGAN AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE. 



BY PRESIDENT T. C. ABBOT. 

 [Spoken at Manchester and Romeo Institutes.! 



AVhen a student enters the Agricultural College he is set at manual labor, 

 three hours each afternoon, every day of the week except Saturday and Sun- 

 day, and he continues this work until within a few weeks of the close of his 

 four years' course of study. It is long continued, real work, and for it he is 

 paid wages from eight cents an hour as the highest down to nothing, if 

 he earns only that. The students work as faithfully as they study, and they 

 study as well in this college as students study in any college with which I am 

 acquainted. There is as much ambition to stand well in wages as in lessons, 

 and a large proportion of the students ask for, and sometimes receive, addi- 

 tional work on Saturdays. No doubt one might see students and parties of 

 students at times neglectful or careless in their work, as he may also see them 

 in their studies. But, as a general thing the work is well done, and you may 

 any afternoon see parties of students under one of their number as a foreman, 

 and solitary students unconscious of observation, working steadily and with a 

 faithfulness that shows tliey are interested in their work, and are conscientious 

 in the discharge of duty and the gaining of correct habits of labor. 



In the sophomore or second year of a student, all his labor is performed in 

 the Farm Department, so that he may be enabled to see the work of that de- 

 partment in its entirety. In the Junior or third year, he labors only in the 

 Horticultural Department for a similar reason. While seniors, in their last 

 year at college, they work upon farm or in the horticultural department as 

 they may be needed, or as their future pursuits may make them to ciioose. 



The seniors frequently act as foremen of gangs of students at work. One 

 senior has had charge of the construction of a drain, others of fence build- 

 ing, or of surveying and leveling for drains. In the Horticultural Depart- 

 ment, Professor Beal says. Report 1 878, p. 67 : " About one-half of the students 

 of the senior class have worked all the year in the Horticultural Department. 

 Some of the most important part of the instruction is given separately to each 

 of these young men while they are overseeing certain kinds of work. One 

 senior is set over some portion of the department for the whole year. One 

 looks especially after the vineyard ; one the apple orchard ; one the orchard 

 of pears, cherries and plums; another the trees on the lawn; another the 

 drives and paths; one the hot-beds and a portion of the vegetable garden ; one 

 the wild garden and testhig seeds; one the experimental and sample beds of 

 grasses, clovers, etc. ; another some portion of the vegetable garden." These 

 seniors work in these duties and at the same time act as assistant foremen iu 

 directing the labors of other students. 



