INTRODUCTORY 3 1 



States approximately two hundred and eighty-five million 

 dollars. Various attempts have been made to show that 

 this sum is a mere bagatelle when compared with the huge 

 increase in agricultural production directly attributable to 

 better and more scientific methods of farming. That farm- 

 ing is now generally conducted on a better basis no one will 

 deny. To what extent this improvement may be credited 

 directly to the work of the Department of Agriculture is 

 more problematical. There seems to be no question, how- 

 ever, but what it has been the chief and most valuable single 

 agency. That this is the belief of those whom we elect to 

 represent us in Congress is abundantly evidenced by the 

 ever increasing number of activities with which it is charged, 

 and the ever mounting sums of public funds placed at its 

 disposal. Small as these sums may be when compared with 

 those necessary for the conduct of some of the other de- 

 partments of the Government, the rate of increase is most 

 significant.^'' 



Beginning with a single clerkship in the patent ofRce in 

 1843, it now numbers its officers and employees by the thou- 

 sands. In 191 7 not less than eighteen thousand seven hun- 

 dred and fifty men and women, most of them specially 

 trained for their respective tasks, were devoting their time 

 to the multitudinous duties of the Department of Agricul- 

 ture. As previously indicated, not all of the work of this 

 department is directly in the interest of agriculture and the 

 agricultural class. However, the welfare of the farming 

 industry and of those who carry it on is still, and probably 

 will continue to be, the goal and raison d'etre of this im- 

 portant agency of government. 



Having briefly traced some of the forces that have been 



"* In his report for 1891, Secretary Rusk said: " In concluding the 

 review of the work done under the several divisions of this Depart- 

 ment since the date of my last annual report, it gives me pleasure 

 to state, and I say this advisedly, that each one of more than a dozen 

 divisions whose work I have reviewed has returned in actual value 

 to the country during the past year far more than the entire aiumal 

 appropriation accorded to this Department." 



