Hope Springs Eternal

Cornell University

I haven’t given up hope on spring.  I know it seems overly optimistic but I’m sure it’s coming despite the below freezing temperatures, snow and hail we’ve enjoyed throughout April.  Spring is the best time to play around in the garden, do some planting, pull some weeds and plan for the days when the world is not frozen.

All these hopeful thoughts led me the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agriculture Library, the world’s largest agriculture research institution, on the grounds of the Agricultural Research Center in Beltsville, Maryland. The library dates back to 1862, when it was created with the USDA to provide farming information and resources to the public.  The have amassed an incredible collection of 4 million items across a spectrum of agriculture issues including plant and animal sciences, wildlife ecology, nutrition, forestry and meteorology.  The archives include all the Department of Agriculture publications and documentation of agriculture dating back to the 1500s.  NAL is currently working on converting their massive collection to create the National Digital Library for Agriculture.

Another important role that the NAL plays is to connect the network of Land Grant Universities, field libraries and cooperative extensions around the country.  Although both terms rang faint bells in my brain, their definitions were murky at best, so I dug in.

Washington State University offered me some clarity.  Land grant colleges (now mostly Universities) were set up in the late 1800 to teach agriculture, science and engineering (with a smattering of classical arts) to the working classes of America during the industrial revolution.  Beginning in 1862 and lasting over many decades, different Acts of Congress established Land Grant Colleges with different levels of federal support.  

Representative Justin Smith Morrill of Vermont introduced the idea of giving federally controlled land to states so that they could establish and endow "land grant" colleges. The Hatch Act, passed in 1887, created agricultural experiment stations at each college (doesn’t that sound like fun?) to conduct research, solve problems and experiment with best practices.  
Once discoveries were made, the colleges needed a way to get the news out to the farmers scattered across their state.  The Cooperative Extension System was born.  Cooperative Extensions are a nationwide network of offices, staffed by experts who offer practical information to farmers, small businesses, consumers and children in their communities.

Land grant universities continue to offer all Americans a wide range of educational opportunities across the nation.  If you read the list of LG Universities you’ll find some of most renowned research universities in the country.  I discovered that Cornell was NYS’s land grant college, established in 1865.  Cornell is now an ivy league university offering undergraduate and graduate programs in Ithaca, New York City, and Doha, Qatar.  CALS - the College of Agriculture and Life Science is described as “the very best college of its kind in the nation, if not the world. Our mission is to discover, integrate, disseminate, and apply knowledge about agriculture and food sciences, applied social sciences, environmental sciences and the life sciences as a basis for sustainable improvement in the lives of people throughout New York, the nation, and the world.”

The story of land grant colleges demonstrates the power of federal government to create programs that shape the future and provide a positive impact on the world.  Certainly there was a greater need for the creation of infrastructure in the 18oo but it is something to consider as states slash their budgets to bare bones and our federal government stands back to take in the show.