#the united states department of agriculture yearbook

[lychens]

Insects: The 1952 Yearbook of Agriculture published by the United States Department of Agriculture. Illustrations by Art Cushman.

[cdchyld]

Just added to the Vintage shop - “Keeping Livestock Healthy” Yearbook of Agriculture 1942, United States Department of Agriculture

[antihumanism]

“If all the matter in the universe except the nematodes were swept away, our world would still be dimly recognizable, and if, as disembodied spirits, we could then investigate it, we should find its mountains, hills, vales, rivers, lakes, and oceans represented by a film of nematodes. The location of towns would be decipherable, since for every massing of human beings would be a corresponding massing of certain nematodes. Trees would still stand in ghostly rows representing our streets and highways. The location of the various plants and animals would still be decipherable, and, had we sufficient knowledge, in many cases even their species could be determined by an examination of their erstwhile nematode parasites.”

--N. A. Cobb describing his idea for a really cool Skyrim mod in the 1914 Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture

[uwmadarchives]

Student Historian in Residence: Hello from the Archives!

My name is Rena Yehuda Newman (They/Them), the new Student Historian in Residence at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Archives. I’m here on this tumblr in the name of being a good self-historian. Here I’ll be documenting the research, ideas, epiphanies, philosophies, reflections, and poetry of the archives during my residency. Under the hashtag #UWStudentHistory, I’ll be sharing my musings on the regular, and you can follow me on this whimsical adventure through boxes of mystery materials and memories yet uncovered.

As a History student entering their Junior year at UW-Madison, I find myself thinking a lot about memory. As a young Jewish kid, I remember a someone once telling me the difference between history and memory. History is concerned with what happened, while memory asks a different question: Who am I because it happened?

In a day and age of revealed political turmoil and growing unsafety of marginalized communities in the United States, asking this question of memory has become front and center for me. Participating in civic discourse as a young white, Jewish, non-binary artist and writer means that I hold all of my identities in both hands. I also inherit the histories and memories of all these categories -- and regardless if I understand them or not, the stories of those who have come before me shape who I am today. 

As a student at UW, I inherit the legacy of this institution. Long, problematic, strange, niche, agricultural, brilliant, radical, racist -- UW is all of these things, embroiled in contradiction. I write this blog post sitting underneath an 1892 portrait of a white University President reclining in a three-piece suit, sitting next to a copy of “The American Archivist” journal bookmarked to a paper about archivists and reparations activism. Behind me are boxes and boxes of mixed materials, many of them uncatalogued, many of them with secrets inside. 

There are the public radio reels and the collections from the Dictionary of American Regional English, where linguists interviewed people all around the country just to hear how people spoke. There are time capsules in here, and reports about corn. There are the images of the prestigious Ku Klux Klan UW chapter from the early 1900s in our yearbooks. There are fliers from protests and rallies and statements that the Chancellor released to mollify roiling student bodies, students who shouted in the streets, who wanted to protect Japanese students from internment, who demanded an African American Studies Department, who protested weapons contractors and chemical companies, who bombed Sterling Hall. What I’m saying is, it’s not simple. But as a student, all of it is mine. 

Just as all of it is mine, I want my peers to know that all of it is ours. All of these students from eras past have been us, even the ones who have been ‘against’ us. There’s a lot to learn from knowing that. It’s hard to remember who we’ve been when our community is so transient that every four or five years, UW hits reset. Yet the archives remind me that every time I step onto Library Mall for a rally, I join a long tradition of other students, often standing against the University, who organized and fought. The memory of those actions lives here in the University Archives, tucked away by the lake shore dorms, quietly humming away on the fourth floor of Steenbock Library.

In the time that I’m here, I seek to study student activism from the Vietnam War era, focusing specifically on the political organizing of students of color. I want to learn about presence of organizations like Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), up-and-coming chapters of the Black Panthers and Asian American student organizations, as well as how the University responded to these organizations and demonstrations. I want to know how they organized, how they talked to each other, who tried to erase them, what impact they made. I hope that the materials will guide my research and lead me into new understandings. I also want to be aware of absent voices -- whose papers are not here in the archive? Have not been sorted or tagged? Honoring absence in history is itself part of the history, and can itself be an act of restorative justice. These are all things I hope to bear in mind in my time here.

As I go deeper, I hope to connect other students to the wonderful staff and space here at the archives. I want to bring peers into the work. Collective memory is at the heart of who we are and who we become, and history can never be learned alone. I can’t wait to get started.

- Rena Yehuda Newman (They/Them) 

[historicalbookimages]

page 347 of "Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture 1907" (1908)

[nemfrog]

“The Carson Meadow Mouse.” Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture. 1909.

[govpubsfinds]

This document is an annual yearbook report for the United States Department of the Interior, National Parks Service. It has articles, images and maps highlighting the importance of the National Parks. In addition, this publication is significant because it discusses the influence the Civilian Conservation Corps had in the creation the National Parks.

“Recreation, as applied in this country to parks and areas set aside for intensive recreational use, is an absolute necessity in the social structure of the Nation. Recreation can best be defined as the use of leisure time – leisure time being that time in our lives not needed for eating and sleeping, or earning a living in business, agriculture, and industry.” Conrad L. Wirth, Supervisor of Recreation and Land Planning, National Park Service 

United States. National Park Service. (1940). 1940 Yearbook, Park and Recreation Progress. Washington, DC: United States Printing Office. Full text available via 

https://alliance-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/primo-explore/fulldisplay?docid=CP71232099920001451&context=L&vid=UW&search_scope=all&tab=default_tab&lang=en_US

[othmeralia]

To celebrate National Pink Day (June 23rd), we present this brilliant botanical illustration of a hybrid carnation from the Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture, 1897. 

[onionringsquotes]

United States Department of Agriculture, Yearbook of Agriculture, 1894

A meal in which there is more than one texture is most pleasing. A meal of mashed potatoes, soft rolls, meat loaf, stewed tomatoes, and apple betty is pretty dull. Raw carrots or lettuce, in place of the tomatoes, or Melba toast, instead of the rolls, would help.

Or, on oft or mushy vegetables, try a topping of slivered almonds, bacon bits, chow mein noodles, peanuts, water chestnuts, french-fried onion rings, toasted crumbs, or crushed dry cereal.

Other toppings of another texture are sautéed mushrooms, buttered croutons, chopped hard-cooked eggs, diced pimiento, onion or green pepper rings, carrot curls, and cheese cubes. Relishes are good, too.

[fatalbellman]

Great Horned Owl chromolithograph by Louis Agassiz Fuertes from The United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook, 1908

[historicalbookimages]

page 123 of "Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture 1913" (1914)

[othmeralia]

Our first # #Feathursday post and we couldn’t be more excited! We present to you this barred owl from the pages of the Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture, 1894.

[historicalbookimages]

page 123 of "Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture 1913" (1914)