78 THE PORTRAIT GALLERY 
a study of the animals themselves. In 1896 he went to Iowa 
where he organized the material for and published a 200-page 
book on “Judging Livestock,” still the classic on this subject. 
It has gone through seventeen editions and many thousands of 
volumes, but its story is not yet fully told. In 1899 he arranged 
the first interstate student’s livestock judging contest at the Trans- 
Mississippi Exposition at Omaha. 
Proressor Craic felt seriously the handicap of failing hear- 
ing and a permanent lameness in one leg, and in 1901 he 
deemed it best to retire from college life. As soon as this 
decision became known he was offered the managing editorship 
of the Iowa Homestead, in Des Moines. Here the quaint sim- 
plicity of the pastoral genius that introduced his utterances in 
his text book, received a fuller rein, but his editorial life was 
too short. Failing health could not stand the confinement and 
the following year he practiced farming in Barron Co., Wiscon- 
sin. The season was too severe, however, and he found relief 
at San Antonio, Texas, where he established Oakmore Farm. 
Here he did some of his best work as a writer, and spent the 
happiest and most hopeful period of his life. 
As his health was improving, he accepted in 1903 the position 
of dean and director of the Texas Agricultural College and 
Experiment Station, but the play of politics was too much for a 
man who never sold his manhood nor sacrificed a principle. He 
returned to Oakmore in 1906 only to be called two years later 
to Oklahoma. A factional political fight dealt illy with him 
here and he resigned at the end of the 1909-10 school year. At 
a tremendous sacrifice of energy, he had given these institutions 
new direction and new life, and he had blazed a way that has 
made it easy for his successors to follow. He returned from 
Stillwater to Oakmore and after a brief illness passed beyond 
on August 9, 1910. 
