22 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
enormous as are the numbers engaged in 
those interests, but little attention has 
been paid to reducing these interests to 
a scieiitific basis, or equipping those en¬ 
gaged in this occupation for perfection in 
their work. 
You will find that the first agricultural 
society was started in Philadelphia in 
1785, and had the names of George Wash¬ 
ington, Benjamin Franklin and others as 
prominent on its lists. The first profes¬ 
sorship of agriculture was established at 
Columbia University at about the same 
time, in 1795. George Washington, 
Benjamin Franklin/ and the others of 
whom I might speak took an active inter¬ 
est in scientific learning in this line. The 
present interest, however, can be dated 
from about the time of the Civil War. 
The passage of the Land Grant Act in ’62, 
may be said to institute the first concrete 
movement which still bears fruit for those 
people engaged in this tremendous and 
important work. It seems surprising 
that school men should have so long neg¬ 
lected the practical application of the 
principles of education in this field and 
that thi* mass of our population should 
not have had the benefit of scientific study 
and research. The schools did, however, 
under the attractions of the Rennaissance, 
devote the main part of their time to the 
study of the classics, especially Latin, and 
to the development of a type of educa¬ 
tion which is known even today as “cul¬ 
tural”—a part of which is a certain dis¬ 
regard, amounting almost to contempt, 
for the practical. For a long time there 
has been, and is today in many commun¬ 
ities a feeling that it is unworthy to 
spend one’s time in the study of practi¬ 
cal things, and a corresponding respect 
for the man who is educated and trained 
along the lines of so-called “culture, don't 
you know.” This movement has not vet 
J 
expended itself, and there are more pu¬ 
pils in the schools of the United States 
today studying Latin than any other one 
subject, with the possible exception of al¬ 
gebra. Fifty per cent, of the pupils of 
the United States still study Latin, and 
Latin is required in nearly all college en¬ 
trance examinations and in most curricula 
of the colleges throughout the Union. I 
cannot quite appreciate the necessity for 
a superficial knowledge of Latin, when 
a man’s life work is to be the growing of 
tobacco or corn or cotton; and it seems to 
me it would be far more beneficial to the 
individual and to society at large if such 
a student would spend the time which he 
devotes to “culture” in the scientific 
study of the growing and curing of to¬ 
bacco, or corn, or cotton; the prevention 
of diseases and the cure for same, and 
the wonders of germination and growth 
and maturity. 
My education has been a classical one, 
if you will pardon a personal allusion, 
so that it represents a mighty revolution 
for me to say that in my judgment our 
educational ideas are fundamentally 
wrong, and whereas the majority devote 
themselves to the study of the classics 
and the small minority to the agricultural 
studies, the majority should devote 
themselves to a practical education, leav¬ 
ing to the minority the dilettante pur¬ 
suits of the so-called “culture.” 
Since 1862, there has grown up a num¬ 
ber of institutions based upon that act of 
Mr. Morrill whose duty it is to instruct 
the mass of people in the practical affairs 
of life. These institutions now number 
50, one of which is your own State Uni¬ 
versity. There are fifty institutions act¬ 
ing under the Morrill Act, the Land 
Grant Act, and other Acts supplementarv 
thereto. Of the students attending these 
colleges, a large per cent, is women, and 
