Rhode Island Agricultural Experiment Station: Homer Wheeler (Rec. Gr. 73)

Series 1. Field Experiments: Permanent Records
Box 1-5, Folder 1-19a
The Field Experiments: Permanent Record Series constitutes a permanent and complete record of all the agricultural experiments conducted by the Agricultural Experiment Station in the span of years listed above. A portion of the station's farm land was divided into plots which were staked out, numbered, and assigned to a particular member of the staff to conduct agricultural experiments in his area of interest or in areas of research designated by the station director. The staff member recorded the procedures he followed for each experiment each year, and the results of that experiment, in the field experiment plot books. These are large ledger style volumes which are divided by plot number. A researcher wishing to know what experiments had been conducted on a particular plot in the past year or several years had only to consult the plot book for his particular plot to learn its complete experimental history.

The field experiment books represent a valuable resource in that they provide a complete history of the changing research interests of the Rhode Island Agricultural Experiment Station over an extended period of time. They also provide a complete record of the procedures followed and the result achieved.

Arrangement: The series is arranged numerically by experimental plot number.

Series 2. Field Books: Annual Reports
Box 6-11, Folder 1-24
The information recorded in these annual field experiment books is the same as that which can be found in Series I, but in a different format. Series I contains reports of all the experiments conducted on one experimental plot over several years; series II contains reports on all experiments conducted on all experimental plots in one year. Researchers recorded the type of experiment, the procedures followed, and the results obtained for each experiment for each plot for the year.

These field experiment books, taken in total, provide a history of the experimental focus of the Experiment Station over a period of years. Viewed in concert with the permanent record books of Series I, the annual field experiment books provide a comprehensive overview of the experimental focus of the station as agricultural needs changed and technology improved.

Arrangement: The series is arranged chronologically by year and numerically by plot number within each volume.

Series 3. Farm and Office Journals
Box 12-16, Folder 1-35
Series 3 consists of daily journals or diaries of various office and field staff of the station. With two exceptions the authors of the diaries are unidentified, but appear to be an equal mix of office and field staff. The journals record the daily activities of the station in the field, in the laboratory, and in the office. Activities range from tending the greenhouses to sweeping out the barns.

Of particular interest in this series are the daily journals of W. F. Adams, the first superintendent of the Experiment Station. In his 1890 journal, Adams documented the work necessary to turn the Oliver Watson farm into a working experiment station farm and agricultural school. Other diaries record the daily routines of the office staff, research staff, and the greenhouse superintendent.

Arrangement: The diaries/journals are arranged chronologically by year.

Series 4. Research Notes: Faculty and Staff
Box 17-27, Folder 1-97
Series 4, Research Notes, contains the pocket notebooks carried by station researchers in which they recorded in rough form the procedures used in their experiments, the results obtained therefrom, and various random observations and calculations. This information was later recorded more completely in the annual and permanent record books for the research plots. The research value of the notebooks is limited by the ability of the researcher to understand what the notes and miscellaneous jottings mean.

Arrangement: The series is arranged alphabetically by the name of the staff member who owned the notebook. Unidentified notebooks have been placed at the end of the series.

Series 5. Weather Data
Box 28, Folder 1-12
The Weather Data Series consists of monthly reports submitted by a local weather observer to the United States Department of Agriculture's Weather Bureau. The reports contain daily observations on weather conditions, maximum and minimum temperatures, amount and type of precipitation, and observations on unusual weather phenomena such as thunderstorms, snowstorms, etc., in the Kingston area.

This series is valuable in that it provides a complete record of weather conditions in Kingston over an extended period of time. This makes possible comparison with weather conditions in other eras and, used in conjunction with Series I and III, can provide some indication of the possible effect of weather conditions on crops.

Arrangement: The series is arranged chronologically by month. Cumulative statistics are at the end of the series.

Series 6. Charles O. Flagg Correspondence
Box 29-34a, Folder 1-107
This series contains the administrative correspondence of Charles 0. Flagg, the first director of the Rhode Island Agricultural Experiment Station. Flagg was appointed in 1888 to direct a station which at the time had no land, no staff, no facilities and no money. It was to be his responsibility to hire a staff, supervise the construction of a laboratory on the newly purchased Oliver Watson farm in
Kingston, and to do whatever else was necessary to get the station established in the state.

Contained in this series is Flagg's correspondence with President John Washburn of the newly established agricultural school to which the station was attached, with actual and potential members of his staff, and with the U.S. Department of Agriculture which funded the station's activities. Also of interest in this series are letters from farmers throughout the state requesting information on a variety of agricultural topics. A reading of these letters provides one with an overview of the issues and topics that concerned local farmers in the last decade of the nineteenth century.

Arrangement: The series is arranged alphabetically by the name of the correspondent and chronologically by date thereunder.

Series 7. Arthur B. Brigham Correspondence
Box 35-46, Folder 1-132
This series contains the administrative correspondence of Arthur A. Brigham who succeeded Charles 0. Flagg as director of the Agricultural Experiment Station in the late summer of 1897. As is the case with the Flagg Series, it includes correspondence with local farmers, a variety of businesses, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Included are letters from dozens of commercial fertilizer manufacturers, the regulation of whom was placed in the hands of the Agricultural Experiment Station. Station staff sampled commercial fertilizers throughout the state, analyzed them to determine if the percentage of ingredients contained therein met those guaranteed by the manufacturers, and published the results in station bulletins. Irate letters from the offices of fertilizer companies whose products did not meet their guarantees comprise a large element of this series.

Arrangement: Incoming letters are arranged alphabetically by the name of the correspondent, while copes of outgoing letters are arranged chronologically by date and are contained in letterpress copybooks placed at the end of the series.

Series 8. Homer J. Wheeler Correspondence
Box 47-104, Folder 1-511
The Homer J. Wheeler Correspondence Series contains the administrative correspondence of Wheeler, who was appointed the third director of the station in 1901 when Brigham resigned to take a position in private industry. Wheeler was a member of the original station staff, having been appointed station chemist in 1889. Shortly after his appointment as the director of the Agricultural Experiment Station, he assumed the mantle of acting president of the college in 1902 and 1903 between the resignation of John Washburn in August and the appointment of Kenyon Butterfield the following April. He resigned in 1912 to become the chief agronomist for the American Agricultural Chemical Company, a position he held until his retirement in December 1931.

Mr. Wheeler received B.S. degrees from Massachusetts Agricultural College and Boston University, and a Sc.D. from Brown University in 1911, and a D.Sc. from Massachusetts State College in 1933. He died in
Montclair, NJ, on November 19, 1945.

Wheeler was an aggressive and often irascible administrator who brooked no nonsense in carrying out his duties. This attitude is apparent in his correspondence with manufacturers of commercial fertilizer who regularly, if unintentionally, violated the law regulating the sale of commercial fertilizers in the state. He constantly threatened "scofflaws" with prosecution in very blunt language and proceeded to carry out those threats whenever he felt it necessary to do so. He was equally blunt with critics of the station.

Arrangement: Incoming letters and copies of some outgoing letters are arranged alphabetically by the name of the correspondent. The bulk of the outgoing letters are arranged chronologically by date and are located after the alphabetic file. Finally, copies of some of Wheeler's outgoing letters are contained in letterpress copybooks and are placed at the end of the series.

Series 8a. Mason H. Campbell Correspondence
Box 104a, Folder 1-9
The Mason H. Campbell Correspondence Series contains the administrative correspondence of Campbell, who was appointed to the station in 1942. He continued in that position until 1959. The letters contained in this series are mostly from only two years of his tenure as director of the Agricultural Station.

Arrangement: Incoming letters and copies of some outgoing letters are arranged alphabetically by the name of the corespondent or subject.

Series 9. Staff Correspondence
Box 105-125, Folder 1-192
This series contains the professional correspondence of the staff members of the Agricultural Experiment Station for a fifteen year period. Subjects of the correspondence include research interests and techniques, publications, exchanges of information with colleagues from other institutions, and miscellaneous professional concerns.

Arrangement: The correspondence in this series is arranged alphabetically by the name of the staff member and alphabetically by the name of his correspondent. Letterpress Copybooks containing copies of the staff member's outgoing letters are placed at the end of the alphabetic listing of the staff member's, correspondence.