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Here a serendipitous find that I came upon while searching biographical detail regarding a 1924 University of Chicago Ph.D. (Victor Nelson Valgren) whose career took him off to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Apparently not in copyright, according to archive.org, is the following survey of the field of agricultural economics from 1840 through 1932. Every department of economics worthy of its name in the first half of the twentieth century had at least one agricultural economist on the faculty so this is a useful work to have handy.
The link below takes you to the archive.org site where you can either read on-line or download a file in any one of a variety of formats. Here is a USDA biography about Henry Charles Taylor, the senior author of this survey.
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Henry C. and Anne Dewees Taylor, The Story of Agricultural Economics in the United States, 1840-1932. Men-Services-Ideas. Ames, Iowa: Iowa State College Press, 1952.
From the Forward by Everett E. Edwards
…No one is better qualified to outline this story than Henry C. Taylor — the first professor of agricultural economics in a land-grant institution, the author of the first American textbook dealing with the principles of agricultural economics, and the organizer and first Chief of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics in the U. S. Department of Agriculture. In addition to this intimate and first-hand knowledge of the field is the fact that the Taylors had at their command the time, the resources, and the skill to see that the task be adequately done. The story is not only interestingly told, it is well documented….
The project of writing the history of the development of agricultural economics owed much to the fact that the senior author
has had a lifelong interest in history and the historical method as a medium of approach to the social sciences. I do not know when
Clio won Taylor as a disciple. Certainly his association with Richard T. Ely and Frederick J. Turner at the University of Wisconsin in the 1890’s stimulated that interest. His studies in the London School of Economics, and in the University of Berlin at the turn of the century, gave further emphasis to the importance of the historical approach to the problems of a dynamic agriculture. While in Europe, he tried his skill in the use of the method by searching for pertinent material and writing the history of the decline of landowning farmers in England and along with that the constructive work of the English in solving the problems of equitable relations between landlords and tenants.In his pioneering in the teaching of agricultural economics at the University of Wisconsin, Taylor emphasized the historical method. He required his promising graduate students to familiarize themselves with the method — to go to the history department and take a seminar in research methods with W. L. Westerman or F. J. Turner. It was Taylor who emphasized both the historical and the geographical methods in the Bureau of Agricultural Economics, and from that day to this the Bureau has had a unit serving as a clearing-house on historical matters. But Taylor used other methods also. He was eclectic. He used the survey, accounting, and statistical techniques along with inductive and deductive analysis. Another of Taylor’s qualifications came from his pioneer experience in the field of agricultural economics and his participation for fifty years in the historical development depicted in this book.
In 1939 the Bureau of Agricultural Economics in co-operation with the Office of the Under Secretary of Agriculture, M. L. Wilson, held a conference to evaluate the historical work done in the Department and draw up a prospectus for future research. H. C. Taylor participated in that conference, which resulted in the suggestion that the history unit of the Bureau of Agricultural Economics initiate a research project devoted to the history of agricultural economics. Anne Dewees was assigned to execute this new project for which she had special qualifications. Trained and experienced as a research librarian, she had the capacity to unearth and gather pertinent data for the project. She was able to see, evaluate, and group ideas and facts in historical relation. She had also an appreciation of the importance of accuracy of quotation and of fact….
Everett E. Edwards
History Section
Bureau of Agricultural Economics
Washington, D. C.
January, 1952
Image Source: Henry C. Taylor from http://www.ers.usda.gov/AmberWaves/November04/Gleanings/recentmeetings.htm at the Internet Archive Wayback Machine (snapshot from November 12, 2004).