Rocky Ford enterprise., 1912-03-29
PROF. BLINN
VINDICATED
Charges of Incompetency Are
Not Substantiated
AGITATION BASED
ON MISc0NCEPTI0N
And Personal Prejudice Fostered by
Sensation Mongers In Yellow
Newspaper

newspaper
The complaints against P. X. Blinn.
the alfalfa specialist, and his manner OF
conducting the Experiment Station at
Rocky lord were heard before the
executive committee of the State Hoard
of Agriculture on Monday in the X. P.
Hall. The committee consisting of A. A.
Edwards of Fort Collins. Gov. J.L. Brush
of Greeley and Sen. E. M. Ammons of
Littleton, was accompanied by Prof. c.
p. Gillette director of the Experiment
Station. L. M. Taylor. secretary for the
board and j. F. Farar. attorney for the
board,
The party arrived in Rocky Ford on
Sunday night and early Monday morning
were driven in autos out to the farm of
the Experiment Station, where they
examined the actual conditions to contrast
with the extravagant claims ofthe charges
in the petition. They found that instead
of ten acres being used for buildings and
experiments as set forth in the petition
that there were fifteen acres in actual
alfalfa experiments with over eighteen
miles of nursery rows thinned to single
plants; that instead of thirty acres being
farmed for profit by Mr.. Blinn there were
only fifteen acres that had been rented
out to the Ryan brothers and F. B. Bolles
The board discovered that there was at
least ten acres Of the forty that were
Unavailable for experiments being occupied
by roads, bitches, drives. buildings and
waste patches. They found that instead
apf Mr.. Blinn using teams. tools and
- ,dipment belonging to the state that he
had been using his own team and imple-
ments fer the bersfit of the station.
1t was very apparent to the board that
the farm needed many repairs and impro-
ments, but it was due to the lack of funds
rather than careless neglect that these
had not been provided. as the U. S. funds
cannot be used for that purpose. and the
state funds are not available.
At 10 o'clock the hearing was called
by President Edwards of the board. The
charges were read and the roll call of
the petition signers read, with only
two answering present, from the much
advertised Large" petition purporting to
represent the farmers of Otero county. J.
H. Dameron of La Junta appeared in
behalf of the petitioners, and Sen. ]. H.
Crowley acted as counsel for Mr.. Blinn.
The following witnesses supporting the
cha rges were called; Will Morrison, o. J
Baxter, D. " Burrell. John Edgar, G. A.
Jones, Henry Ball, G. A. Wheeloek and
G. w. Steward.
There was evidently much prejudiced
, testimony as there seemed to be little
agreement as to the estimated acres of
the alfalfa experiments, or the time Mr..
Blinn "probs bly," had devoted to expert
mental work; it was known that he was
J away from Rocky Ford great deal and
that weeds were growing on the expert
mental farm.
Nearly all these witnesses admitted
they had learned more facts relative to
what was expected of Mr.. Blnn than
they had realized before. The principal
complaint of some of the witnesses seem
ed to be the fact that Mr.. Blinn is an
officer in a cantalcupe seed breeding
concern and that his bulletins and his
connection with the Experiment Station
furnished that firm an unfair advantage
over other seedsmen.
Some of the witnesses tried to repre-
sent that the station had been thoroughly
cleaned up by burning all weeds since
the charges were filed but the board saw
no evidence of the ground having been
gone over since the snow that covered
the ground from December to about the
middle Of February while the petition was
circulated and presented about the first
Of February.
Messrs j. B. Ryan, D. D. Wiley and
F. B. Bolles took the stand in behalf of
Mr.. Bnn. Their testimony re uted much
of the misleading evidence that had been
.dvanced.
=, The objections relative to the trip to
kA;kansas by Mr. Blinn to lecture on
cantaloupe culture for one Of the rail-
roads was overruled by Director Gillette
who justified his authorization OF the trip
on the grounds that Mr.. BlInn was paid
out of government funds and that no
tate has right exclusively to informa-
on acquired at government expense.
Mr.. Blinn was then callsd. He related
straight forward account of the time
s,ce his appointment Of Field Agent for
te Experiment station in 1905, and