58 TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY REPporT. 
practical problems with individuals selected according to their loca- 
tion and fitness. These views probably did not meet with popular 
approval, but had their essential spirit more fully prevailed in the 
organization and management of experiment stations, there would 
have been a greater advance in knowledge than has been attained. 
During the years immediately following the administration of 
Dr. Sturtevant the Station entered upon a period of material de- 
velopment. Within the space of seven years, under the lead of 
Dr. Collier, a large cattle barn, the chemical laboratory and the 
forcing houses were erected and provisison was made for three 
staff houses. ; 
Early in his administration Dr. Collier called attention to the 
importance of the stock interests of the State, especially the dairy 
industry, and advised that the Station should do more in this direc- 
tion. As one result of this recommendation, breed tests were in- 
stituted, in the pursuance of which important data were collected 
concerning several breeds of dairy cattle. He also advised estab- 
lishing a department of fertilizer control at the Station and through 
this movement a law was passed placing the inspection of fertilizers 
in the control of the Station and at’ the same time, and largely 
because of the law, funds were provided for the erection of a 
chemical laboratory. 
Other recommendations of Dr. Collier were the organization of 
at least ten branch stations in the State, to be under the immediate 
supervision of local boards of control, the: central control to be at 
Geneva, and the establishment at the Station of a department of 
agricultural implements. Neither of these propositions materialized 
and it is fortunate that the first one did not, for a much more effi- 
cient and economical method is now in vogue, viz.: The studying 
of problems in any place where opportunity offers. The only 
justification for establishing branch stations is that they offer a 
better opportunity for studying a variety of conditions than does a 
single station. But when it is remembered that each one of the 
sixty counties of the State has within itself a great variety of agri- 
cultural production under equally variable conditions, the futility 
of attempting to multiply branch stations to meet all local needs 
is made evident. The contention of the first Director of the Station 
that a central research effort should be maintained, combined with 
a study of practical application of knowledge in various parts of 
the State as opportunity offers, is the prevailing policy in some 
States, especially the older ones, and is one that experience appears 
to justify. 
