14 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



University campus and the Agricultural College buildings on the 

 farm, is now in process of erection the handsomest building in 

 the University group, the new home of the College of Agriculture 

 and of the State Board of Agriculture. This building is 266 feet 

 long, three stories high, constructed of native limestone quarried 

 on the College grounds, and thoroughly fire-proof. It is well 

 adapted to the uses to which it will be put. It contains an audi- 

 torium with a seating capacity for 500 persons, to be used for 

 farmers' conventions and for the accommodation of large classes 

 of students in the College of Agriculture. It is a matter of con- 

 gratulation that so large, well planned, well constructed and so 

 handsome a structure is to be secured for the appropriation made 

 by the last General Assembly. This building will be completed 

 within a few months, and will need to be equipped with labora- 

 tory desks, hoods, scientific appliances and furniture, and we would 

 recommend that the legislature appropriate for this purpose the 

 sum of $15,000. 



More Liberal Support for the College of Agriculture and Ex- 

 periment Station. — Missouri has not been as liberal with its Col- 

 lege of Agriculture as it should have been. The last Illinois legis- 

 lature appropriated nearly four times as much money to its college 

 of agriculture as Missouri has given hers in its entire existence 

 of thirty-eight years. Kansas last year appropriated to its col- 

 lege of agriculture more than twice as much money as Missouri 

 has given hers since it was founded. Even the new state of Okla- 

 homa has already expended on her college of agriculture much 

 more money than has Missouri expended on hers. 



It should be realized that money appropriated to the College 

 of Agriculture and Experiment Station and the Board of Agricul- 

 ture is not money spent in the ordinary sense, but is money most 

 wisely invested. For example, in an experiment conducted in 

 South Missouri by the College, by proper fertilization the yield of 

 corn was increased from 18 to 45 bushels per acre on thin land. 

 This is 50 per cent more than the average yield per acre of this 

 county, and showed a net profit over and above the cost of fer- 

 tilizer and treatment of $4.67 per acre, which, when applied to the 

 95,000 acres planted to corn, it would amount in a single year to 

 $441,750, or more than twice as much as the State has given to 

 the College of Agriculture since it was organized in 1870. Re- 

 ducing this increase one-half, and applying it to the 7,000,000 

 acres normally grown in corn in the State, we would have a net 

 increase in the farmers' returns of $15,850,000 — enough to con- 



