stock improvement through good breeding and sire selection, and in good business methods based on sound economic principles. He has been slower in recognizing that the improvement in crops and in live-stock would not have been possible without a parallel improvement in his buildings, machinery, and equipment, and in good soil and tillage conditions resulting from wise use of irrigation and drainage. Publicity regarding the facts along these lines has, however, changed the attitude of the farmer, so that, to-day, he is beginning to see the help that scientific engineering service can be to him.

There is much talk to-day about low prices on farm products resulting from overproduction. Such arguments are misleading. It is certain that the world will never grow richer by limiting produc

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tion. The question of quantity production is one of balance, and the question of price determination is a collective one but little influenced by the work of the individual farmer; nor do these questions influence the amount of his profit in anything like as great a degree as do the factors that help him to reduce the unit cost of production. The farmer who has worked out the method which gives him the larger crop per acre, and of highest quality, at less cost in money and labor per ton or per bushel, has settled, once and for all, the question of profitable farming and a better rural life.

It is common knowledge, to-day, that the amount of labor required to produce a single bushel of wheat in 1850 is sufficient to produce over forty bushels to day. This is not at all surprising when one thinks of the equipment of production in 1850, such as the single horsedrawn walking plow and the grain-cradle, operated by man power, in comparison with the plowing equipment of from two to ten bottoms drawn by tractor power, or the grain-binder of the present day.

The authorities in agricultural economics tell us that the three items of labor, power, and equipment make up about 30 per cent of the cost of production of hogs, 60 per cent of the cost of production of alfalfa hay, and as high as 80 per cent of the cost of production of corn. The only way to reduce these items of cost is through better equipment, better buildings, more efficient farm machinery. Good buildings and good farm machinery are not so much a luxury as they are a means of reducing the cost of production on the farm.

According to the United States census for 1920, the twelve States of Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, California, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Ohio, Texas, Wisconsin, and Indiana have the largest investment in farm tractors and other modern farm equipment. They also contain one-third of the farms and one-half of the farming area of the country. Hence they should serve as a good index to show how important the engineering side of agriculture has grown to be in the United States. The investment in buildings, machinery, and equipment on the farms of these States is

so large that it is a very influential factor in the cost of production on the farm. It, therefore, seems clear that unwise selection, inefficient operation, and the large depreciation, through poor maintenance, of such costly equipment, may make the cost of production so high as to absorb all the profits that may be secured by better seed-bed preparation, high-quality products, and good livestock; yet, in spite of the fact that, in these States, the farm investment in livestock is only one-half as great as that in machinery and buildings, much more scientific study has been given to livestock than to farm buildings and farm machinery.

The neglect of the proper steps in the clearing and drainage of waste land on existing farms also stands as a constant menace to the economy of production on the farm for two very definite reasons: First, the existence of these waste areas, which must be fruitlessly worked across or steered around with great difficulty, causes a marked increase in the cost of all field operations, this increase often running as high as 33 per cent. Second, the great total extent of these unreclaimed areas boosts the average investment in land on the farm, in at least six of the twelve States named, from the average flat rate of $77 per acre for all land in the farm up to about $135 per acre for the portion tillable without reclamation, thus requiring an unusually high rate of return on the good land to cover the lack of return on the waste acres. Yet, in these six States, there were in 1920 about 12,500,000 of acres of potentially good farm land still wholly unproductive from lack of drainage, and about 10,o00,000 of acres of unimproved wood and stump land. The improvement of these waste acres has, doubtless, been delayed by the fact that it has sometimes happened that large tracts where reclamation work has been undertaken are still unproductive, unfortunately, because the design and the installation of the reclamation works were carried out by engineers who did not possess the needed scientific knowledge of or training in the relations between soil development, crop improvement, and soil-moisture control. The logical remedy for this ill lies,

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and arrangement. He must, therefore, come to rely upon engineering experts for advice in the selection, installation, and operation of efficient modern methods and equipment, and on their help in the production of such equipment. following facts in regard to farm equipment and conditions, in 1920, in the twelve States previously mentioned, show the vastness and the complexity of the problem the farmer has to meet when he attempts to cut down his cost of production by the use of modern reclamation methods or of modern machinery and by improvement of his farm buildings.

There are in use, on the farms of these States, about 165,000 tractors, ranging, in horse-power, from one to eighty-five,

representing about one hundred different types and put out by some fifty different companies. The use of tractors on farms is increasing at a tremendous rate each year.

Exact figures are not known for all these States, but, if we may take one or two as a sample, it seems probable that there are considerably over half a million stationary engines in use on these farms, represented by a greater number of models than are the tractors.

The average investment in farm buildings per farm, in these States, is $2,558.

The average size of farm is 204 acres, with an average value of $77 per acre, only 116 acres of which are suitable for use until drained or otherwise reclaimed. That is, only about 55 per cent of the land is fit for tillage. This boosts the actual investment in tillable land, therefore, to about $135 per acre.

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GROWTH OF EDUCATIONAL AND PROFESSIONAL RECOGNITION *

Agricultural engineering really had its beginnings in the early history of our country, for any invention or development in machinery or mechanical methods that has caused great progress in agriculture may properly be considered an achievement in agricultural engineering. Among such events one thinks of the cotton-gin, invented in 1792 by Eli Whitney; the modern plow, with the development of which the name of John Deere is prominently connected, in the public mind; the reaper, first perfected in 1831 by Cyrus H. McCormick; the modern self-binder, which first appeared in all its present essentials in 1880; and the modern farm tractor, without which present-day farming would be impossible. The history of the development of any one of these reads like a romance to which no one can listen without a thrill.

Reclamation work, including irrigation, drainage, and land clearing, the primary purpose of any of which is the rendering of more land fit for growing crops, is a phase of agricultural engineering practised, in considerable measure, from the earliest times. (Who has not read of the famous Roosevelt Dam, through which was made possible the converting of a quarter million acres of arid waste in

the Salt River valley, in Arizona, into fertile farm lands through irrigation; or of the Kankakee Marsh, in Indiana, the draining of which converted over half a million acres of quaking bog from a nuisance and a pest hole into a veritable garden?)

Nevertheless, the growth of the agricultural engineering idea as a technical unit in education and professional life has been very gradual. Elementary training in allied lines of work had its beginnings about forty years ago, but such training was not thought of as engineering training. In the land-grant colleges, the courses of study of the departments of agriculture generally provided, at the outset, for elementary instruction in physics of agriculture, drawing, mechanical training, and land reclamation that would give, to the farmer and the investigator in agricultural science, such knowledge of these fields as it was clearly necessary for him to have.

During this earlier, formative period, such subjects were not generally recognized as a related group, but each was taken on individually as a necessary, unclassified aid to what were then considered the more fundamental and important lines of work. Even after it began to be recognized that the various lines of mechanical instruction and allied work could and should be grouped together as a class, this group was not called engineering and it was not engineering. Nevertheless it must be recognized that agricultural engineering as a profession is the direct outgrowth from this early group of mechanical activities.

THE AMERICAN SOCIETY OF AGRICULTURAL ENGINEERS

Although, for many years, most people interested in agricultural development and education did not seem to recognize the birth, growth, and importance of agricultural engineering, there was, nevertheless, on the teaching staffs of the faculties of the various agricultural colleges a small group of men whose work was the teaching of farm mechanics and allied lines, who recognized the importance of their field and who had a great and abiding faith in its future. In December, 1907, a few representative men

vancement of engineering science as applied to agriculture. At this meeting the American Society of Agricultural Engineers was born. Although less than twenty years old, this society is, to-day, recognized as one of the strongest and most influential engineering societies in the United States. It already has a membership of over five hundred, including men in every department of the field, educational, professional, industrial, and commercial. It supports a paid secretary on full time and publishes, monthly, a technical journal of recognized standing entitled Agricultural Engineering. The society is represented on the American Engineering Council, through which it exerts a marked influence in shaping national engineering policies and industrial development. The activities of this society cover the following broad and interesting field, from the standpoints both

ing, ventilation, sanitary arrangements, and water-supply.

Farm mechanics, covering animal, steam, gas, and electric power, tillage machines and implements, farm-home conveniences and related equipment.

Land reclamation, covering land-clearing, drainage, prevention of soil erosion, and irrigation and related structures and equipment.

COLLEGE COURSES IN AGRICULTURAL ENGINEERING; THEIR INCEPTION, CHARAC

TER, OBJECT, AND STANDING Closely following the organization of the American Society of Agricultural Engineers, the first technical courses in agricultural engineering, on a par with those in civil, mechanical, and electrical engineering, were established, in 1909, at Iowa State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts and at Nebraska State