BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 199 



The veterinary inspectors of the bureau were placed in the classified 

 service by Executive order dated May 28, 1894, and the first exami- 

 nation was held by the Civil Service Commission June 22, 1894. To 

 be eligible for the examination the only restriction made was that 

 the applicant should be a graduate of a veterinary college. This 

 remained in effect until July 1, 1899, when the standard was raised 

 and the requirement made that the applicant should be a graduate 

 of a veterinary college having a course of not less than three years. 

 This was changed in January, 1900, to the requirement that veteri- 

 narians were eligible who were graduated during or prior to 1897 from 

 veterinary colleges having a course of two years, while those graduated 

 after that date must be from colleges having a course of three years. 

 This standard was modified again in January, 1903, by requiring 

 that applicants from a veterinary college having a course of three 

 years must have spent at least two years in the study of veterinary 

 science at a veterinary college. The necessity for this provision 

 arose from the fact that certain veterinary colleges inaugurated the 

 custom of giving degrees after one year of attendance and allowed 

 two years' credit for time previously spent at agricultural, medical, 

 or other colleges. 



The demand for veterinarians for employment in practice and in 

 the work of the bureau was so great that the existing veterinary 

 colleges were not able to supply the requisite number. Some colleges 

 did not give sufficient attention to the preliminary education of the 

 students enrolled and were not particular as to the scope of the 

 instruction given, the number of branches taught, and the length of 

 the course. For this reason it was found that although sorne of the 

 graduates were able to pass the somewhat restricted civil-service 

 examination, a considerable number were not sufficiently educated 

 to make satisfactory inspectors and were not professionally qualified 

 for the important duties assigned to them. 



Accordingly it was deemed advisable to adopt some means to 

 designate the course of study, as an adjunct to the examination, 

 which should be provided by colleges that wished to prepare graduates 

 for the civil-service examination for veterinary inspector. In order 

 to obtain expert advice as to the subjects to be included in a proper 

 curriculum and the amount of time (number of hours) to be devoted 

 to each, the Secretary of Agriculture in February, 1908, appointed 

 five representative and fiualified veterinarians as a cornmittee on 

 veterinary education, for the purpose of obtaining information regard- 

 ing the course of instruction then given at veterinary colleges and to 

 make recommendations as to the matriculation examination and the 

 course of instruction necessary to qualify graduates of these colleges 

 for admission to the civil-service examination for the position of 

 veterinary inspector in the Bureau of Animal Industry, 



This committee visited the various colleges for the purpose of 

 obtaining the desired information, and as a result of its inquiry made 

 recommendations as published in Circular 133 of the Bureau of 

 Animal Industry. This circular was distributed generally, and most 

 of the veterinary colleges proceeded at once to put the recommenda- 

 tions into efl"ect. 



On January 21, 1909, on my invitation a conference of representa- 

 tives of all the veterinary colleges of North Anierica met at Washing- 

 ton to consider with the committee above mentioned the whole matter 



