Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1901-08-02
STUDYING PRACTICAL FARMING
An Experiment About to be Undertaken
BY the Agricultural Department.

BY the Agricultural Department.
There has never been a time whel
educated young men and women look
ed so eagerly as they do today for fresl
opportunities of earning a livelihood
Hence, from their point of view, th,
utmost interest attaches to an expert
ment about to be undertaken by th,
Department of Agriculture, which il
going to give employment at moderat,
wages to considerable number of
newly graduated collegians of botf
sexes, while equipping them in specia
branches OF knowledge and making
them able to earn more money. At thu
end of two years they will be adopted
into the regular classified service o
the Government at good salaries.
This new chance may be expected te
attract many ambitious young people
to the ag ricultural colleges in the va.
rious States, inasmuch as only gradu.
ates of those institutions will be ac
cepted by the Department. It is
anxiously desired by the government
to create a corps of thoroughly trained
experts in various branches of science
relating to farming, gardening and
fruit growing, from which it may
draw for talent of that kind whenever
it is wanted. At the present time no
university Or other educational estab-
lishment in the country furnishes the
equipment required for much of the
work that the Department of Agricul-
ture has to dO-such work, for exam
pie, as the study of soils and of the
diseases of plants-and hence the
Department is driven to adopt the
expedient of ~instructing young men
and women in these branches. Having
acq uired the rudiments in the agricul-
tural college; they will take a post
graduate course under Uncle Sam,
paying nothing and receiving wages
while learning.
The opening is as attractive as it is
exceptional. Fifty young men and
women are to be taken on immediate
ly, chosen from newly graduated
classes at the agricultural colleges, and
fresh patches of them will be accepted
by the Department year after year,
to replace those who have passed into
the classified service, SO that there
may always be corps of students
passing through the educational pro
cess and preparing for promotion.
Each student will bear the dignified
title of scientific aid, and will receive
a stipend of forty dollars month
This sum, it is considered, will furnish
4 bare but sufficient maintenance, SO
that nobody will be shut out by reason
Of lack of means.
The idea originated in the big brain
Of the clever man who is now doing so
much to expand the usefulness of the
of fAgriculture-Se A
James Wilson. Speaking on the
'ubject In conversation the other day
le said:
Agricultural education Is new. 1t
iates back only to 1862, when Con
yress established the agricultural col
eges, and to 1887. when the expert
nent stations we're endowed There
s no university in America, or in the
world, where graduates of these col
eges can go for a postgraduate course
II order to specialize their training for |
,ne or more branches of scientific |
work. Hence this department, which
$ pushing investigation along many
ines of research, finds itself embarrass-
ID for lack of available men. We are |
obliged to train our own men, and,
Lfter they have been trained, wealthy |
Institutions and foreign countries take |
hem away from us by offering them |
alaries much higher than we are per
nitted by law to pay.
"a great field has been newly opened |
O young men and women. There is |
demand not only by the Department |
# Agriculture, but in every State in
he Union and in every country III the |
world, for experts trained in these |
branches of knowledge. Not long ago
We sent young man to Hawaii to |
each the people certain matters reIat
ng to the art of sugar making, and
low he goes to New Zealand at salary
f $15. 900 year. Wealthy corpora
ions interested in agricultural enter
,rises will pay almost any price for
uch services; money is no object if
hey can secure the skill Such con-
ern in South Africa has been asking
he Departm mt to find person to 60
here and supervise the administration
If vast tract which is to be turned |
o account for purposes of animal hus-
,andry.- 1t will pay any salary.
Recently the japanese Government
that country buys enormous quanti- |
les of tobacco from the Uuited
'tates-has taken away from US, at a |
alary of $6, 900 a year, our best phosi-
logical chemist, who was specially
in tobacco research Not
ontent with that, an attempt from
he same quarter was made to deprive
Is of our next best expert in the same
inc. The lost man we have been un-
lble to replace, and it is not surprising
hat We should have felt compelled to
lpply to Congress for permission to
,ive higher wages to some of our
scientists. Meanwhile, we must educate
resh experts, even though we have to
10 it at our own expense.
A notable feature of the opportuni-
" here discussed is observable in The
act that the opening is for young
women as well as for young men,