United States Department of Agriculture, 



BUREAU OF SOILS CIRCULAR No. 13. Revised. 



MILTON WHITNEY, Chief of Bureau. 



U. S. DEPARTMENT OK AGRICULTURE, 



Washington, D. C., April 8, 1905. 



SIR: I have the honor to transmit herewith a manuscript, "The Work of the 

 15 urc '.an of Soils." This is intended for distribution at the Lewis and Clark Exposi- 

 tion at Portland, Oreg., and contains a condensed account of the work of this Bureau, 

 with particular attention to its practical side. I respectfully recommend that this 

 be published as a revised edition of Circular No. 13 of this Bureau. 

 Respectfully, 



MILTON WHITNEY, 



Chief of Bureau. 

 Hon. JAMES WILSON, 



Secretary of Agriculture. 



THE WORK OF THE BUREAU OF SOILS. 



In 1894 a division was created in the Weather Bureau " for the study 

 of climatology in its relation to soils." At the time of its creation it 

 had a chief of division, 4 soil experts, 3 clerks, and 2 laborers. On 

 July 1, 11)01, the Division was made an independent bureau of the 

 Department of Agriculture, and on January 1, 1905, its force con- 

 sisted of a chief of bureau, chief clerk, 83 scientists and soil experts, 

 13 tobacco experts, and 29 clerks and other employees. Thus, in 

 ten years its personnel has increased frorh 10 to 12T, or more than 

 12 times. Great as this increase has been, however, the Bureau's 

 force is not adequate to meet half the demands made on it for investi- 

 gations along its special lines. 



It was not a new problem which the Bureau undertook to solve. 

 The study of soils had been carried on by State organizations and 

 foreign governments for nearly a century. Many attempts had been 

 made to classify soils according to the laboratory results obtained in 

 investigations of the chemical composition or the physical properties 

 of the soil, but the problem proved too intricate for solution by 



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