amounted to upwards of a million dollars, and on single farms it was not uncommon to suffer a loss of a thousand dollars in the course of a few months. In 1888 Doctor Billings published a voluminous bulletin of 400 pages on Swine Plague. A large part of the bulletin, however, was taken up with an altercation with D. E. Salmon of the United States Department of Agriculture over the disease. Doctor Billings gave up his work with the University on June 30, 1889, but was reemployed in 1891.

The first appropriation under the Hatch Act did not become available until March, 1888, but the Board of Regents had appropriated $3,500 for experimental work for the year beginning July 1, 1887. There was a little grumbling here and there that the Hatch Act did not afford more than $15,000 a year, but certainly that was better than depending on the Legislature. The working staff of the station, as given in the first annual report presented to the Governor January 26, 1888, included Henry H. Wing, agriculturist; Hudson H. Nicholson, chemist; Frank S. Billings, investigator of animal diseases; DeWitt B. Brace, meteorologist; Lewis E. Hicks, geologist; Conway McMillan, entomologist; and Charles E. Bessey, botanist.

The third annual report of the experiment station for the year ending January 24, 1890, affords a good idea of what the Station was accomplishing at the close of this period. Dr. Lewis E. Hicks in 1889 had succeeded Dr. Charles E. Bessey as director of the station. J. Stuart Dales served as treasurer, along with his other financial duties in the University. The working staff of the station was made up of Jared G. Smith, assistant agriculturist; Hudson H. Nicholson, chemist; Rachel Lloyd, assistant chemist; DeWitt B. Brace, physicist; Harold N. Allen, assistant physicist; Lewis E. Hicks, geologist; Lawrence Bruner, entomologist; Charles E. Bessey, botanist; and S. W. Perin, superintendent of the farm. The Experiment Station had drawn largely on the University faculty for members of its staff, in most cases small amounts being

added to their usual salaries. In June, 1888, the following salaries to be paid from the Hatch fund were allowed for the year ending June 30, 1889: Director $350, treasurer $400, chemist $200, meteorologist $100, geologist $100, investigator of animals diseases $3,500 (Mr. Billings resigned on June 30, 1889), entomologist $1,500. The rest of the $15,000 was to be devoted to experimental work, publication, and miscellaneous.

Sugar beets were rapidly coming to the front and we find the department of chemistry making efforts in this direction. Within the next few years two sugar factories were to be established in Nebraska and the subject was to be one of the most important to Nebraska farmers for several years. In March, 1889, Professor Nicholson distributed a large amount of beet seed received from the United States Department of Agriculture among the farmers of the state. A committee of the State Board of Agriculture, appointed to visit the station, reported in 1889:

"The sugar beet industry, claiming and receiving as it now does so large a share of public attention at large, in the United States, is given careful and thorough investigation at this Station, showing unexpected and most gratifying results. The saccharine yield of Nebraska-grown beets is found equal with the best sugar-producing countries in the world. The yield in tons per acre, of beets, is also most gratifying. Sections of the State and soils heretofore thought not adapted, are found to be admirably so."

The chemistry department was also undertaking "an investigation of the soils and water of the state." The department of physics was paying special attention to climatological data. Doctor Hicks planned for his department soil surveys of the state and a study of irrigation. In economic entomology "the insects of economic relation to agriculture and horticulture were studied with a view to remedies for injurious species, and the increase and spread of beneficial ones." The botanical section of the station announced its work as consisting of a study of the

grasses and forage plants of the state, a study of the parasitic fungi of the plants of the farm and garden, a study and description of the woods of the state, a study of seed germination, and studies in plant physiology and pathology.

A list of the early bulletins affords some idea of the subjects with which the experiment station was concerning itself:

Bulletin No. 1-Irrigation in Nebraska. Lewis E. Hicks, 1888. Bulletin No. 2-Twenty-two Common Insects of Nebraska. way McMillan.

1888.

Con

Bulletin No. 3-Southern Cattle Plague and Yellow Fever, from the Etiological and Prophylactic Standpoints. Frank S. Billings.

1888.

Bulletin No. 4-Swine Plague, Its Causes, Nature and Prevention. Frank S. Billings. 1888.

Bulletin No. 5-Some Lawrence Bruner. 1889.

Injurious Insects of the Year 1888.

Bulletin No. 6-Report of Progress. H. H. Wing. Field Experiments and Observations for the Year 1888. Jared G. Smith. Meteorological Record for the Year 1888. DeWitt B. Brace. 1889.

Bulletins Nos. 7, 8, 9, 10-Original Investigations of Cattle Diseases in Nebraska, 1886-89. Frank S. Billings. 1889.

Bulletin No. 11-The Smut of Wheat and Oats. Joseph C. Arthur. The Smut of Indian Corn. Charles E. Bessey. A Preliminary Enumeration of the Rusts and Smuts of Nebraska. Herbert J. Webber. Notes on the Fungi of Economic Interest Observed in Lancaster County, Nebraska, during the Summer of 1889. Roscoe Pound. Observations on the Cottonwood. Albert F. Woods.

Contributors to Bulletin No. 11 were to achieve more than ordinary prominence in later life. Roscoe Pound was to become dean of the Harvard Law School, and Albert F. Woods was to become president of the University of Maryland. At this time Mr. Pound was assistant in the botanical laboratory and Mr. Woods was a senior student in botany. Arthur, Bessey, and Webber all became wellknown names in the field of botany.