The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture by Cobb James C. Walker Melissa

Author:Cobb, James C., Walker, Melissa
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
Published: 2008-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

Knapp, Seaman A.

(1833–1911) AGRICULTURAL REFORMER.

Seaman Asahel Knapp brought many experiences to his goal of improving southern agriculture. As editor, college president, essayist, teacher, and organizer, he acquired the skills necessary to secure acceptance of his most important idea: the Farmers’ Cooperative Demonstration Work program.

Reared in Essex County, N.Y., Knapp graduated from Union College. Acting upon a physician’s advice to seek outdoor activities, he moved to Iowa in 1866 and began a lifelong study of agriculture. As professor and president of Iowa State College (now University), he urged farmers to adopt scientific farming practices. Knapp also edited the Western Stock Journal and Farmer, emphasizing the use of better livestock and the diversification of crops. In 1885 he became head of the North American Lumber and Timber Company and moved to Louisiana. For the next decade, he convinced farmers that rice could be grown by using modern agricultural practices. In 1898 Knapp joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which sent him to Japan, where he discovered a rice strain more suitable to America’s mechanized demands.

Panic struck Texas cotton farmers in 1903 as the boll weevil devastated wide areas. Knapp’s effort to combat this insect gained for him a national reputation and set into motion an agricultural program that promised hope for the South. Backed by financial guarantees from local citizens to compensate for any losses, Knapp persuaded farmers to try methods on their own lands that few had been willing previously to employ. They began using crop rotation, deeper plowing, better livestock, diversification, improved seed selection, and fertilizers. Initially, 7,000 to 8,000 farmers joined the program. The results were impressive. Cotton yields increased 50 to 100 percent over farms using older methods. The boll weevil remained, but Knapp’s ideas offset losses from the insect and the Farmers’ Cooperative Demonstration Work program was born. Impressed by Knapp’s success, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and later the General Education Board provided funds to spread the program throughout the region. The General Education Board’s commitment stemmed from its belief that as the economic status of rural taxpayers increased, better schools would result. Farmers’ Cooperative Demonstration projects also contained educational programs including boys’ and girls’ farm groups—the forerunners of the 4-H clubs.

By the time of Knapp’s death in 1911, the Farmers’ Cooperative Demonstration Work program was firmly established in the South. A fitting tribute to Knapp’s efforts occurred in 1914 with the passage of the Smith-Lever Act, which incorporated the Farmers’ Cooperative Demonstration Work ideas into national law.

JOSEPH A. COTÉ

University of Georgia Library

Rodney Cline, The Life and Work of Seaman A. Knapp (1936).

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.