ee a 
New York AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. 57 
that the function of an experiment station is to solve the individual 
problems of the farm and not to dictate business management. 
The initial policy of the Station at Geneva was largely determined, 
of course, by the point of view of its first director. It was for- 
-tunate that Dr. Sturtevant saw clearly the need of well-established 
fundamental facts and principles as a basis of farm practice. He 
was keenly alive also to the possible errors of prevailing methods of 
experimental work of the so-called practical character and gave 
much attention to determining their source and extent and the 
means of minimizing them. He held that much preliminary work 
was needed in order to learn how to experiment and how to in- 
terpret results and the first six annual reports of the Station con- 
tain many data on the errors of certain classes of experiments, 
especially those of the field and stable. As to the broad function 
of the Station, Dr. Sturtevant asserted that its object “is to dis- 
cover, verify and disseminate.” By this he meant that the Station 
should establish new principles and facts of importance to agri- 
culture ; discover and verify the uses of both old and new knowledge 
in agricultural practice and by some means acquaint the agricultural 
people with the new information. He believed the great want of 
agriculture to be the establishment of principles that shall serve as 
a guide to reasoning. ‘This is a sound and well-balanced policy. 
Rightly interpreted it leaves no room for an all-absorbing effort 
of popular instruction into which so many station men have un- 
fortunately been thrown. 
Dr. Sturtevant held positive views in other directions. He be- 
lieved that the organization of the Station was faulty in that it 
did not place the sole management and responsibility upon the 
director. He held that the function of the Board should be limited 
to the control of the financial interests and the appointment or dis- 
placement of the Director, giving the Director power to appoint 
his own employees and carry out his own ideas untrammeled. He 
declared that unity and continuity of direction could not be secured 
in any other way. If in any case the management is not successful, 
the remedy is to displace the Director and appoint another. It is 
quite safe to say that this view now prevails quite generally in 
practice, if not in theory, in the management of experiment stations. 
Dr. Sturtevant also advised that the work of the Station should 
not be confined to the Station grounds. He practically advocated 
placing the Station on a Smithsonian footing with a central band 
of workers engaged in independent research and locating distinct 
