196 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



the question, but the economic side as well. In the last 

 few years a number of railroad companies have lent their 

 support by running good roads trains over their lines. 



A few years ago the Office of Road Inquiry established a 

 laboratory for the testing of road-building materials, and it 

 has proved of much benefit. Congress has shown its inter- 

 est in the work of the office by making liberal increases in 

 the appropriations for the maintenance of the work from year 

 to year. 



Office of Experiment Stations. 



The Office of Experiment Stations supervises the expendi- 

 ture of the national funds given to the several States and 

 Territories for the maintenance of agricultural experiment 

 stations, and aids them in various ways in the development 

 of their work. 



There are now BO of these stations in the United States, 

 and they employ about 700 persons in the work of adminis- 

 tration and investigation. In the })ast j'ear they published 

 445 annual reports and bulletins, which were distributed to 

 over half a million addresses on their regular mailing lists. 

 The total income of the stations is over $1,200,000, of 

 which 1720,000 is given by the national government and 

 about $500,000 is received from the State governments and 

 other local sources. 



This office also directly manages the experiment stations 

 in Alaska, Porto Rico and Hawaii, which have now become 

 firmly established, and are doing good work for the promo- 

 tion of aiiTiculture in these remote reo-ions. It also has 

 relations with the experiment stations and kindred institu- 

 tions throughout the world, and obtains from them much 

 information which is of use in promoting the agricultural 

 interests of this country. It has recently issued a bulletin 

 describing the organization and work of 720 stations now in 

 operation in foreign countries, for there is now hardly a 

 region in the world that does not maintain these useful in- 

 stitutions. 



The Office of Experiment Stations issues a large number 

 of publications based on the work of the experiment sta- 

 tions at home and abroad. The most important of these 



