Contact: Maridith Geuder
Scores of historians and others convene at Mississippi State Thursday [June 17] for a symposium highlighting eight decades of American agriculture.
Approximately 100 scholars are expected at the university for a three-day meeting titled "Eighty Years of Agriculture and Agricultural History."
In addition to MSU, symposium sponsors include the Farm Foundation, American Agricultural Economics Association Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service. The annual gathering last was held at MSU in 1978.
The 1999 program focuses on agriculture since the 1919 inception of the Agricultural Historical Society.
Based in Washington, D.C., the society promotes study and research and publishes a quarterly journal, Agricultural History. In addition to historians, the nonprofit organization's membership includes farmers, economists, archivists, sociologists, and other interested parties.
Conference sessions will focus on such areas as the New Deal, the impact of cotton, rural population shifts, USDA's agricultural policies, and women and immigrants in 20th century agriculture, among others.
Speakers represent a wide range of academic and service institutions. Scholars from Yale, Syracuse, Iowa State, and Texas A&M universities, Sarah Lawrence and Converse colleges, and the Smithsonian Institution will be among those attending.
Lowell K. Dyson, retiring executive secretary of the Agricultural Historical Society, presents the keynote address Friday [the 18th] at a noon luncheon in the Bost Extension Center Auditorium. His topic is "History of the Agricultural History Society."
Retired MSU history professor Roy Scott and current agricultural economics department head John Lee are symposium coordinators. For more information, telephone (662) 325-2750.