HEARINGS BEFORE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE. 373 
localities, but it is not simply a question of an individual locality and 
the interests involved in that locality when we go to make study. We 
do not want to go into any locality unless there is some question there, 
the study of which we think will bring out results which will be of 
use broadly. So that there need be no fear with reference to that 
matter that we shall try to spread this work out and make a great 
survey or anything of that sort. 
Mr. Mead has spoken of some of the lines of work, and yet he 
has omitted one direction in which our work is developing, which is 
reflected in the Book of Estimates in the suggestion for the broadening 
of the type of this work and in the use of certain things a little differ- 
ent from what was used last year. Mr. Mead has already pointed out 
that the work under this appropriation is no longer confined to irriga- 
tion, but covers drainage and questions relating to the application of 
power, not only to irrigation, but to other agricultural purposes. 
Mr. Scorr. Is that what you mean, Doctor True, by this phrase 
“agricultural engineering?” 
Doctor Trur. That is what we mean by the phrase “agricultural 
engineering.” That matter of drainage, of course, is not a matter at 
all confined to the irrigated regions. For example, when I was out in 
Iowa last summer, visiting the experiment station there, I spent a 
good deal of my time on the cars passing through that State, in discuss- 
ing with men questions relating to drainage of large tracts of land in 
Iowa. They need, in some respects, as it appears to me, to change 
their drainage laws. They need to adopt better methods of drainage. 
There are large tracts of land where lately they have had a great deal 
of trouble, in Iowa as well as in other States; so that there are large 
questions relating to drainage, and we are taking those up as Mr. Mead 
has indicated. 
Beyond that the farmers of the country, and particularly of the 
West—that is, beyond the Alleghenies—are coming to take a great deal 
more interest in problems relating to the proper care of their farm 
machinery and the use of the best kinds of machinery for specific 
purposes. . 
It is a curious thing that while in this country we have been the larg- 
est users of agricultural machinery, the Department of Agriculture 
has never taken any direct interest in that matter and never had any 
funds at its disposal which it could use for investigation along that 
line, so that the whole matter has been left to the manufacturers of 
machinery. But even the manufacturers themselves are now coming to 
realize that to make the best kind of machinery and specialize that 
machinery, as the farmers desire more and more to have it specialized, 
they should have in their employ a class of experts who have not only 
studied mechanical engineering in the ordinary way, but have studied 
it with reference to the agricultural use of the product. 
So, to meet the demands of the farmers and the demands of the man- 
ufacturers, the agricultural colleges are taking up the study of prob- 
lems relating to farm machinery. They are organizing courses of 
instruction along those lines. They are putting up special buildings 
for use in those courses. 
We have had recently in the the State of Iowa a fine building put 
up by the agricultural college which will be wholly used for instruc- 
tion and for investigation along these lines. Wisconsin has an appro- 
priation of $15,000 this year for a special farm engineering building. 
