oO STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



farm. Students were sometimes, when together, given some information 

 regarding farm operations, but received no regular instruction in agriculture. 



l)r. Manly Miles, M. D., professor of Physiology, gave in 1862 and 18G3 some 

 instruction in Veterinary Medicine and Stock Breeding, but there was no regu- 

 lar instruction in Agriculture except that given by the professors of Chemistry 

 and Botany until 1865, Dr. Miles liaving been appointed the first professor of 

 Practical Agriculture in the autumn of 1864, the second year of my presidency 

 of the College. 



Dr. Miles at once systematized the instruction in Agriculture, at first using 

 the best text books that could be liad in this new field of college instruction, 

 and gradually bringing to perfection those courses of lectures which proved so 

 useful and inspiring to successive classes in the College. 



Chietly at my suggestion, the labor of students was brought mainly into the 

 compass of one session of three hours in the afternoon of each day, thus bring- 

 ing it into more complete control of the officers, and making it more educa- 

 tional to the students. On Professor Prentiss's proposition, the labor of an 

 entire class (now Sophomore) was to be given to the farm, and that of another 

 (now Junior) to the Horticultural Departmen, thus giving the departments an 

 opjiortunity to give systematic instruction in different kinds of work. 



Dr. Miles mapped out the farm anew, into fields of about twenty-five acres 

 each, and established the present rotation of crops, and inaugurated and began 

 a plan of drainage of the farm. He found the stock of the college, excepting 

 some Essex swine, of the most inferior quality, and began to improve it by 

 gradual sales of cattle and tlie purchase of fewer animals of pure blood. By 

 an arrangement with myself, which the Board permitted to go on undisturbed 

 for some years, the receipts on account of stock went to the improvement of the 

 stock. By this means tlie College stock became respectable in quality long 

 before any money appropriated to the College by the Legislature was expended 

 directly for stock. The College owes much to the very great ability and the 

 enthusiastic industry of Dr. Miles. 



Dr. Miles was succeeded in 1875 by Professor Alfred B. Gulley. during whose 

 two years' service very general improvement was made in the fields and grounds 

 of the College. At the close of Mr. Gulley's first year the superintendency 

 of all the work on the farm and in gardens was given him, and Mr. C. L. 

 Ingersoll nuide Professor of Agriculture. The additional expense, on our fail- 

 ure to realize the sum of money estimated as necessary to our current expenses, 

 caused the abandonment of the plan. 



Professor Charles L. Ingersoll, a graduate of the College, was ap])ointed to 

 his present place in January, 1877, having ])reviously served as foreman of 

 the farm. The area of ground under cultivation has been increased by Pro- 

 fessor Ingersoll, and a steam engine set up as a motive power for the barns. 



For the management of the farm and of students' work Prof. Ingersoll has 

 two foremen of the farm — ])oth i)ractical farmers, competent of themselves to 

 manage farms, and one of them a graduate of the College. The general man- 

 agement and the control of experiments is with the Professor. 



Students work three hours, from 1 to 4 P. M. every day except Saturdays 

 and Sundays, the Sopliomores and enougii others to make two-thirds the work- 

 ing force being assigned each term to the farm. Tiie teamsters jirepare work 

 for the afternoon. The foreman, and some of the Seniors who understand the 

 work, and frequently the Professor, act as directors and leaders in the various 

 kinds of work. To see what students have done, one should look at the pho- 



