EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



Vol. 41. October, 1919. No. 5. 



Looking backward is not necessaril}- an unprofitable procedure. 

 Especially is this true when progress seems slow and difficulties are 

 disturbing, as sometimes appears to be the case in agi'icultural in- 

 vestigation. In such a mood, as ^vell as at other times, a review 

 of the toil and travail through which a strong and prosperous re- 

 search institution has been developed may be well worth while. 



Opportunity for such a retrospect has recently been afforded by 

 an article entitled Beginnings of Agricultural Education and Re- 

 search in California. This article was prepared as a contribution to 

 the recent Semicentennial of the University of California, and is 

 embodied in the latest report of the California Experiment Sta- 

 tion. Its author is Prof. E. J. Wickson, emeritus professor of horti- 

 culture, who has been connected with the College of Agriculture 

 and Experiment Station for thirty-eight years and w^ho was its 

 dean and director for seven years. Thus it contains a fund of 

 first-hand and authoritative information regarding the early days 

 of the institution, and which, true to the author, is set forth in a 

 graphic and entertaining way. 



Although one of the newer States in point of settlement, Cali- 

 fornia was among the first to manifest an interest in agricultural 

 education and research. The promotion of agricultural improve- 

 ment was specifically included as a legislative function in the con- 

 stitution of 1849, under which the State was admitted to the Union. 

 Efforts to establish an agricultural college began soon afterwards. 

 A speaker at the State Fair in 1857, after citing what had already 

 been done in Michigan and Wisconsin, declared that " there is ten- 

 fold greater necessity for an agricultural school here. Although 

 agriculture has been successfully pursued here for the last four 

 or five years, yet farming has hitherto been a matter of experiment 

 and must continue so for many years to come. We have a dif- 

 ferent climate, a different soil, and different modes of culture must 

 be adopted from what we have hitherto been accustomed to. The 

 farmer has everything to learn. The books treating of agriculture 

 Avritten in the older States or in England are to him of little ac- 

 count, and notwithstanding all the knowledge and experience ac- 

 quired by him elsewhere, he finds himself a novice here. . . . We 

 want then an agricultural college." 



Two years later another writer advocated an institution for the 

 collection and experimental trial of fruits and other plants. This 



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