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American Evaluations of European Agriculture*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Clarence H. Danhof
Clarence H. Danhof
Affiliation:
Princeton University
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Extract

The development of American agricultural techniques in the period JL prior to 1800 may be thought of as occurring through the amalgamation of the techniques and resources of the Old World and the New. The first half of the nineteenth century, though dominated by the changes imposed by agricultural expansion on the frontier and by a growing urban population, featured also careful evaluation of the differences between American and European agriculture, a process that resulted in extensive but selected borrowings. The middle of the century witnessed declarations of American technical independence on the basis of equality and indeed superiority over Europe in some areas and the dominance of the idea that henceforth agricultural progress would depend on America's own exploration and experimentation.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 9 , Supplement S1 , 1949 , pp. 61 - 71
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1949

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References

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2 American Husbandry, ed. Carman, Harry J. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1939), p. 42Google Scholar.

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4 Ibid., pp. 471-73.

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18 For details of the proposal see Genesee Farmer, XIII (1843), 80Google Scholar; Cultivator, X (1843), 77Google Scholar.

19 In ten reports and two volumes, Boston and London, 1844-48. Colman's letters, some of which discuss agricultural subjects were published as European Life and Manners (Boston and London, 1849), 2 vols.Google Scholar It should be noted, as Colman did, that skeptics existed who believed that the United States had nothing to learn from Europe. His reports were greeted critically as insufficiently practical. E.g., Prairie Farmer, V (1848), 162–63Google Scholar. Nevertheless, they were widely read, being printed in a number of editions, and agricultural editors extracted freely from them.

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25 Frederick Law Olmstead cited Colman's work as his reason for making the trip whic h produced Walks and Talks of an American Farmer in England (New York, 1852), p. 2Google Scholar.

26 London, 1851; New York, 1855; Paris, 1855; London, 1862; Hamburg, 1863; Cologne, 1865.

27 Among those who went as official representatives were: Elisha Dyer, Transactions of the Rhode Island Society for Encouragement of Domestic Industry (1863), pp. 57-72; Flint, C. L., Agriculture of Massachusetts (1862), pp. 186 ff.Google Scholar; ibid. (1863), pp. 105 ff.; Johnson, B. P., Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society (1862), pp. 503–656Google Scholar; Johnston, J. F. W., Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society, IX (1849), 24Google Scholar; Hoyt, William, Transactions of the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society, VII (1861) 72 ff., 113 ff., 37 2 ff.Google Scholar; Marsh, W., Transactions of the Illinois State Agricultural Society, V (1861–1862–1863–1864), 40Google Scholar; Reynolds, John P., Transactions of the Illinois State Agricultural Society, VII (1867–1868), 585Google Scholar; Tap-pen, J. L., Transactions the New York State Agricultural Society (1865), pp. 92–57.Google Scholar Among the travelers were: Barry, P., Genesee Farmer, X (1849), 49Google Scholar; Greeley, Horace, Glances at Europe in a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, Switzerland, etc. during the Summer of 1851 (New York, 1851)Google Scholar; Nash, J. A., Cultivator, I (3d Ser.) (1853), 305, 338Google Scholar; American Agriculturist, XI (1853–1854), 17 ff.Google Scholar; ibid., XII (1854), 17; Weld, Mason C., American Agriculturist, XIII (1854–1855), 337Google Scholar; Brewer, William H., Country Gentleman, IX (1857), 33 ff.Google Scholar; Dyer, Elisha, Transactions of the Rhode Island Society for the Encouragement of Domestic Industry (1857), pp. 31 ff.Google Scholar; ibid. (1867), p. 168; Tucker, Luther, Cultivator, VII (1859), 217Google Scholar; ibid., VIII (1860), 9 ff.; and Country Gentleman, XIII (1859), 337 ff.Google Scholar; American Glimpses of Agriculture in Great Britain (Albany, 1860)Google Scholar, also in Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society (1859)Google Scholar; Wright, Joseph, Transactions of the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society, VII (1861), 208–10Google Scholar; Cornell, Ezra, Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society (1863), p. 695Google Scholar;Cultivator (1862), pp. 308, 325Google Scholar; Country Gentleman, XX (1862), 189, 249Google Scholar; Willard, X. A., Country Gentleman, XXVIII (1866), 25, 153Google Scholar; Transactions of the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society (1868), p. 441Google Scholar; Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society (1866), pp. 190–214Google Scholar; Judd, Orange, American Agriculturist, XXVII (1868), 10Google Scholar; Transactions of the New York State Agricultural Society (1859)Google Scholar; Cultivator, IX (N.S.) (1852), 139Google Scholar; Pennsylvania Farm Journal, IV (1854); 1, 11Google Scholar; Prairie Farmer, XX (1859), 57Google Scholar.

28 Marsh, George P. summed up the situation: “The general result, then, of the careful study of European life in all its relation to material things, is that the character of our soil and climate, earth and sky alike, require us to devise for ourselves such adaptations of all industrial pursuits as will bring them in unison with our peculiar circumstances, and thus to accommodate our rural life to the conditions in which nature has placed us.” — Transactions of the New Hampshire State Agricultural Society (1856), p. 89Google Scholar.

29 “We have had theories of agriculture without end, propounded for our consideration; innumerable guesses which have been hazarded upon every conceivable topic; inconclusive experiments which no man can number have been made, and yet to our shame be it spoken, there u scarcely a single question which has been mooted in American agriculture that can be oaid to be settled on the sure basis of reliable experiments.” — John Stanton Gould, president of the New York Sate Agricultural Society, in its Transactions (1866), p. 158. For similar comment by Horace Greeley, see Ross, Earle Dudley, “Horace Greeley and the New Agriculture,” Agricultural History, VII (1933). 12Google Scholar.

30 In his address as President of the New York State Agricultural Society, New York Farmer, VII (1834), 143Google Scholar. Also in Carman, Harry J., Jesse Bud, Agricultural Reformer (New York: Columbia University Press, 1947), p. 146Google Scholar.

31 Cummings, Richard O., “American Interest in World Agriculture, 1861–1865,” Agricultural History, XXIII (1949), 116–23Google Scholar.