Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - History of the University (Nevins) [PAGE 192]

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176

THE UNIVERSITY FINDS ITSELF

cultural organization to fight for it. Three organizations had had representatives on the board of direction of the experiment station, now simply an advisory board—the State Board of Agriculture, the State Horticultural Society, and the State Dairymen's Association; and some of their members were at once ready to assist The State Farmers' Institute was organized with the support of the University as one of its prime objects, and it soon commanded strong legislative support. Appeals were later made to other bodies which came into prominence after Davenport became dean, and some of which were founded for the express purpose of cooperating with college or station—the Live Stock Breeders' Association, the Corn Growers' Association, the Grain Dealers' Association, the Beet Sugar Growers' Association, and so on. Alumni prominent in agriculture, and many well-known farmers never before connected with the University lent their support.1 An increasing pressure began to be felt at Springfield behind the appropriations asked for the college. Four years after Davenport's coming this pressure swept away all opposition to the demand for an agricultural building, though at the time the college had the merest handful of students; two years after this it was sufficient to carry a bill enlarging the scope of the experiment station and granting it $108,000; and two years later still it obtained $122,000 for the college and $170,000 for the station. And quite as important as these gains at Springfield was the fact that in thus fighting for the

Among the names which should be mentioned, representing all sections, are those of C. F. Mills, Amos Moore, | | « Cooledge, S. Noble King, D. M. Funk, L. H. K e r e i c k , J f | m Morrison, H. M. Dunlap, H. A. Aldrich, A. P. Grout, Edwin Shurtleff, E. C. Curtis, Senator Laurence Y. Sherman, Frank I. Mann, Frederick L. Hatch, and Ralph Allen.

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