







































41 
 

The Curriculum and Courses of Study at Connecticut Agricultural College 

During the Stimson Era, 1901-1908 

 
Simon Jorgenson 

University of Vermont 

 

Abstract 

Rufus W. Stimson served as president of 

Connecticut Agricultural College from 1901-1908. 

During this time, he developed and promoted a six-

year curriculum that brought the college closer to 

its natural constituency, practical farmers, and 

more in line with the standards of the best of the 

other land-grant colleges. An examination of this 

curriculum and Stimson’s strategic use of it offers 

important sightlines into a critical early stage of 

land-grant college development when the land-

grant colleges created parallel courses and 

programs for farmers and rural communities, a 

strategy that allowed them to expand the curricula 

and raise degree course standards while still 

meeting their historic obligation to the agricultural 

community. 

  

The size and scope of American land-grant 

universities today belies their modest origins, 

tenuous early history, and “long struggle for 

recognition and respectability” (Johnson 1981, 

333). While the Morrill Act of 1862 provided an 

initial stimulus for extending agricultural and 

mechanics arts education to the industrial classes, 

it welded practical, liberal, and scientific education 

together and left significant room for interpretation 

(Sorber and Geiger 2014). It took decades for land-

grant college presidents, trustees, and faculties to 

make sense of this paradoxical mandate, give 

institutional and curricular form to the educational 

ideals embodied in the act, and prove its value to  

 

Curriculum History 2018: 41-53 

 

the general public. Public approval depended 

primarily on the colleges demonstrating their 

usefulness to farmers, which they did by offering 

secondary level courses for common school 

graduates and short courses for adult farmers until 

state systems of public high schools and university 

extension departments emerged in the early 1900s 

(Eddy 1956, Scott 1970, Larson 1957).  

By 1900 there was growing consensus 

within the Association of American Agricultural 

Colleges and Experiment Stations (AAACES), the 

de-facto national accrediting body of the land-

grant colleges (Williams 1991, 183), that the 

colleges were slowly developing into technical 

universities and were destined to educate the 

leaders of agricultural and industrial progress 

rather than the “mass of farmers’ sons” (AAACES 

1898, 61). From this point forward, college leaders 

worked to expand the curriculum and raise degree-

course standards in earnest. Their primary 

challenge was how to do so while maintaining 

farmers’ support, and they were well aware of the 

effect of course catalogues and other printed 

material on popular opinion (AAACES 1897, 77). 

The curriculum needed to be farm focused but 

signal to prospective students that these were true 

collegiate institutions. Each institution developed 

different depending on state and local conditions 

(Sorber and Geiger 2014).  

Recently, historians have begun to 

reexamine the origins and early history of land-

grant colleges and look more closely at what 

historian Scott Gelber (2013) calls the “fractious 

but productive relationship” (p. 184) between 



 

42 
 

farmers and academic leaders that resulted from 

the inherent tensions in the original legislation. 

This paper follows this revisionist trend in the 

historiography and focuses on Rufus W. Stimson 

and the curriculum and courses of study developed 

at Connecticut Agricultural College during his 

tenure as president, 1901-1908. Connecticut 

Agricultural College during the Stimson era 

provides an illustrative case of the tensions 

between populist farmers and the land-grant 

colleges of New England, where grangers had 

considerable power to shape decisions about land-

grant funding, administration, and curriculum 

(Sorber 2015, Sorber 2018b).  

A publicist by nature (Stemmons 1931, 

111), Stimson developed and promoted a flexible 

curriculum that included six years of education of 

students in regular courses, a winter school for 

practical farmers, and a summer school for rural 

school teachers. Stimson’s strategy was to create a 

curriculum so diverse that each of the college’s 

constituents could find a place (Sorber 2015, 75). 

This curriculum attracted students in record 

numbers, won the approval of Connecticut farmers 

and state legislators, and earned Connecticut 

Agricultural College a respectable place among 

land-grant colleges nationally. An examination of 

this curriculum and Stimson’s strategic use of it 

offers important sightlines into a critical stage of 

land-grant college development when the land-

grant colleges created parallel courses and 

programs for farmers and rural constituents, a 

strategy that allowed them to expand the curricula 

and raise degree course standards while still 

meeting their historic obligation to the agricultural 

community (Sorber and Geiger 2014, 9, 135, 

Sorber 2018a, 16).   

This strategy was particularly crucial to the 

development of institutions, such as Connecticut 

Agricultural College, that were founded as 

practical farm schools and assumed the land-grant 

designation only later, a situation that seriously 

impeded the development of advanced courses in 

the liberal arts and sciences (Geiger 2015). When 

Rufus Stimson became president of Connecticut 

Agricultural College in the fall of 1901, the 

Connecticut State Grange had already succeeded at 

stripping the state’s land-grant fund from Yale and 

forcing the resignation of Stimson’s predecessor, 

George W. Flint. In this paper, I draw on archival 

data at the University of Connecticut and recent 

histories of the New England land-grant colleges 

(Sorber 2013, 2015, 2018a) to more closely 

examine Stimson’s efforts to win back farmers’ 

support. As I argue in the paper, Stimson 

succeeded in reversing farmers’ opinion of the 

college, and repairing the damage done by his 

predecessor, not because he rejected the university 

ideal of broad curricula and high standards but 

because he recognized the political expedience of 

practical courses in agriculture and the need to 

balance curricular developments at the degree 

course level with parallel improvements in service 

to farmers and rural communities. Stimson not 

only saved Connecticut Agricultural College, he 

moved the land-grant colleges significantly closer 

to the concept of cooperative extension, two 

accomplishments for which he deserves greater 

attention and recognition among historians.  

 

Connecticut Agricultural College Prior to 

Stimson 

On April 21, 1881 Connecticut’s General 

Assembly established Storrs Agricultural School 

to teach “the business of agriculture” to boys 15 

years of age or older who were of good moral 

character and whose parents were citizens of the 

state (Stemmons 1931, 34). The school’s founders 

developed a two-year agricultural course that 

combined instruction in agricultural practice with 

instruction in agricultural science (physics, 

chemistry, botany, zoology). Students also 



 

43 
 

received instruction in English, arithmetic, 

geometry, carpentry, and smith work and wrote 

essays on farm-related topics (Stemmons 1931, 39-

40). A revised two-year course in agriculture 

would remain part of the institution’s curriculum 

for nearly 50 years (Stimson and Lathrop 1954, 

79).  

Connecticut, a small New England state, 

gained little from the sale of federal lands granted 

to the state legislature by the Morrill Act of 1862 

(Sorber 2015). Rather than build a new land-grant 

college with supplemental funds from the state 

treasury, Connecticut’s General Assembly 

designated Yale’s Sheffield Scientific School as 

Connecticut’s land-grant institution. Yale’s 

Sheffield School was widely criticized by 

Connecticut’s agricultural community because the 

curriculum was classically based, the agricultural 

course had few graduates, and the school had no 

working farm. After the (Second) Morrill Act of 

1890 awarded significant additional federal funds 

to land-grant colleges, the Connecticut State 

Grange lobbied successfully to have Storrs 

Agricultural School named the state’s land-grant 

institution, and on April 21, 1893, the General 

Assembly transferred the state’s land-grant funds 

from Yale to Storrs and renamed the school Storrs 

Agricultural College (Stemmons 1931, 67-69). 

Rhode Island farmers undertook a similar revolt 

against Brown University (Sorber 2015).   

To create a semblance of college-level 

instruction at Storrs Agricultural College, the 

president and trustees added five new academic 

departments, expanded the agricultural course to 

four years, and began awarding a Bachelor of 

Agriculture degree at the end of studies. In reality, 

the curriculum remained much the same as the old 

two-year course but with expanded offerings 

(Stimson and Lathrop 1954, 78). In 1895-1896 the 

college added a six-week summer term, offered its 

first winter school short course, and developed an 

extension program for farmers at home. In 1897 

the agricultural course was modified to include 

technical subjects (e.g., agrotechny, zootechny) 

recommended by the AAACES, although to a 

limited degree (State of Connecticut 1898, 13).  

On July 1, 1898 George W. Flint became 

the second president of Storrs Agricultural 

College. A year later the Connecticut General 

Assembly marked the institution’s growth and 

expansion by renaming it Connecticut Agricultural 

College (Stimson and Lathrop 1954, 78). Other 

than this auspicious moment, Flint’s presidency 

was a disaster in terms of farmer relations. Flint 

had little interest in educating practical farmers and 

favored a curriculum of general education in the 

liberal arts and sciences as preparation for graduate 

studies and professional training in non-

agricultural fields (Sorber 2015, 70). In his first 

address to the State Board of Agriculture, Flint 

mentioned agricultural education only once 

(Sorber 2015, 69). Dissatisfaction with Flint’s 

administration grew with newspaper reports that 

he was more interested in classical and scientific 

studies than agriculture and planned to eliminate 

the college’s manual labor requirement (Stemmons 

1931, 97-99). The Hartford Daily Courant 

reported that professors at the college “made game 

of all agricultural matters” and “many of the best 

farmers of the state…refused to send their sons to 

Storrs because the conditions that existed were 

likely to ruin the boys” (Demand of Farmers 1901, 

1). Low student enrollment numbers fanned the 

flames of negative publicity as did 

misunderstanding of the land-grant mission. Many 

questioned the idea of maintaining a state 

agricultural college that provided such low return 

on investment. Farmers and the press were 

particularly critical of the college’s curriculum and 

administration (Stemmons 1931, 105).  

This situation came to a head in August of 

1901 with votes of no confidence in the Flint 



 

44 
 

administration by the Connecticut Pomological 

Society and Connecticut State Grange and press 

reports that only one candidate for admissions 

appeared at the five entrance examination 

locations in the state (Stemmons 1931, 101-104). 

The Hartford Daily Courant reported on August 

30, 1901 that in calling for Flint’s immediate 

resignation, the Connecticut State Grange, which 

represented 12,000 Connecticut farmers, cited 

Flint’s failure to “attract students or inspire the 

farmers of the state with confidence” (Mr. 

Patterson's Vote 1901, 8). The trustees had no 

choice but to act and act swiftly, and on October 5, 

1901 they forced Flint’s resignation, made Rufus 

W. Stimson acting president, and resolved to 

recommit the college to agricultural instruction 

(Stemmons 1931, 104-105). Stimson received 

word of his appointment via telegram (Stimson 

1939, 24).  

 

Stimson’s New and Improved Service to 

Farmers 

Rufus W. Stimson had come to Storrs four 

years earlier, in the fall of 1897, after graduating 

from Harvard and the Yale Divinity School to 

teach courses in rhetoric, elocution, ethics, and 

English literature (Moore 1988). Stimson four 

years as a faculty member (1897-1901) at the 

college coincided with the turbulent presidency of 

G. W. Flint (1898-1901). When Stimson became 

acting president in the fall of 1901, the state had 

not approved an appropriation for improvements in 

over ten years, and the college had only eighteen 

students enrolled in its longer courses (AAACES 

1907b, 71, Stimson 1909, 2). Stimson approached 

this situation with a definiteness of purpose and set 

out at once to improve the college’s standing 

among farmers.    

To do so, he proposed to reorganize the 

college’s agricultural courses and radically expand 

its winter school of short courses. Rather than turn 

his back on farmers, he would strive to make 

Connecticut Agricultural College the best farming 

school in the country (Stimson 1939, 25-27). His 

commitment to farmers ran deeper than political 

expedience, however. He was born and reared on a 

farm, claimed several generations of superior 

farmers on both sides of his family, and had 

acquired significant farm experience by the time he 

was twenty-one years old (Stimson 1939, 1909). 

Farming for him “had about it a nimbus of 

nobility” he would later admit (Stimson 1939, 7). 

He saw farmers as the “natural constituency” of 

Connecticut’s land-grant college and believed he 

was both free and legally obligated under the land-

grant acts to design lower level courses on 

“anything and everything which it is found 

practical to teach” to serve this constituency better 

(AAACES 1905, 83).  

Stimson realized, too, that times had 

changed in Connecticut and the college could not 

survive on practical courses or agriculture alone 

(Stimson 1939, 25). About one third of the 

college’s students were from towns and villages, 

and the state’s long-term prospects in 

manufacturing were far more promising than in 

agriculture (AAACES 1907b, 71). As was the case 

at the other land-grant colleges in New England, 

many students that came to Connecticut 

Agricultural College with secondary diplomas had 

no interest in practical training or becoming 

farmers but wanted an advanced scientific and 

engineering curriculum that would allow them to 

pursue middle class careers as teachers, scientists, 

engineers, or civil servants (Sorber 2018b, 117). 

Although Stimson respected the college’s history 

as a practical farm school, he was also aware of the 

need to provide students with opportunities to 

pursue advanced training in other emerging fields. 

In this case, improving service to the farming 

community meant preparing farmers’ children to 

pursue ‘higher’ callings.   



 

45 
 

Stimson asked a faculty committee to 

design a new two-year course in farming for high 

school graduates “to put in the proper place the 

man who had not developed his brain” (AAACES 

1905, 83). This arrangement helped differentiate 

between students preparing to be farmers and 

students with the academic aptitude and interest in 

becoming agricultural teachers, researchers, and 

civil servants. In addition, the college dropped its 

long-standing compulsory student labor policy and 

moved the practicum component of its agricultural 

courses from the college farm to the laboratory 

(AAACES 1905, 83). This made the courses more 

efficient for students who wished to return to the 

farm, which raised the college’s standing among 

farmers. It also created more time for “real training 

in technical operations” for students in more 

advanced courses (AAACES 1907a, 88).  

Soon after taking office, Stimson 

developed a series of new short courses for men 

over twenty that were especially featured in 

college circulars as “furthering profitable 

agriculture” (Stimson 1936). These courses echoed 

the farm school’s founding mandate of preparing 

boys for the business of agriculture. One brochure 

pitched a ten-week poultry course for “men who 

mean to make poultry farming their business” 

(Stimson 1901a). Another described a twelve-

week course in pomology for “busy men”—a 

course designed by Stimson to win back the favor 

of the Connecticut Pomological Society, whom he 

also invited to tour the college farm and orchard 

(Stimson 1901b, Stemmons 1931, 113). Stimson 

considered short courses “pioneer work, more or 

less temporary expedients, for the purpose of 

extending the influence of the college and of 

drawing students to the long courses” (AAACES 

1904, 84). He could envision a time when 

agricultural colleges had a more efficient means of 

serving the needs of practical farmers than 

bringing them to campus and housing them in the 

dormitory for weeks or months at a time (Stimson 

1939, 29, Stimson and Lathrop 1954, 585). Until 

then, he would use short courses to secure farmers’ 

respect and support. Short courses drew farmers to 

the college. When the instruction they received 

helped solve a problem or turn a profit back on the 

farm, the college gained a strong advocate 

(AAACES 1907b, 71). Stimson would quickly 

learn to leverage their support to secure additional 

appropriations from the state.   

Stimson’s summer school for teachers, 

which was devoted exclusively to nature study and 

country life, was key to winning the respect and 

support of rural farmers. Stimson believed that if 

he could prove to farmers in Connecticut’s towns 

and villages that the college knew how to train 

teachers well, then they would be more likely to 

send their sons and daughters to the Connecticut 

Agricultural College (AAACES 1907b, 71). 

Stimson probably knew too that farmers were more 

likely to tolerate land-grant curriculum that 

diverged from agricultural concerns if the benefits 

they received from outreach and extension 

activities uplifted the rural communities they 

called home (Sorber 2018a, 147). As a 

demonstration of the college’s commitment to 

rural communities, teachers paid no tuition or 

room rent to attend the four-week program 

(Connecticut Agricultural College 1902, 65). The 

summer school was entrusted entirely to Stimson’s 

care (Stimson 1909). He invited Edward F. 

Bigalow, a well-known authority on the teaching 

of nature study in public schools, to serve as lead 

instruction for the inaugural summer session of 

1902. At the end of that summer’s program, the 

Hartford Daily Courant printed a detailed 

description of the summer’s work that included 

testimonials from teachers about the quality of 

instruction they received and the “kindness offered 

by all connected with the college” (Summer 

School at C. A. C. 1902). 



 

46 
 

On December 18, 1901, less than three 

months after becoming acting president and two 

years after his predecessor G. W. Flint had 

alienated the very same body, Stimson went before 

the Connecticut Board of Agriculture to share his 

vision for the college. Stimson pledged to put 

Connecticut Agricultural College “right back at the 

door of the common schools” as a first step toward 

“making it more useful to the farming classes” 

(State of Connecticut 1902b, 157). This included 

providing farmers’ sons with opportunities to 

pursue non-agricultural callings. The land-grant 

colleges, he told them, stood for two kinds of 

education—an education which was “down close 

to the people” and an education which would lift 

students “to the highest positions among the 

people” in work and service (State of Connecticut 

1902b, 123). He described the college’s four-year 

agricultural course and how it had been carefully 

attuned to the needs of the farm. He expressed 

regret that the course still combined high school 

and college level education. To fix this, he 

proposed to give “two years more of thorough-

going college grade instruction in agriculture” 

(State of Connecticut 1902b, 159) and noted that 

the next college catalogue would include new 

courses leading to a Bachelor of Science degree. 

He directed the board’s attention to circulars 

showing the twenty short courses planned for that 

winter and encouraged them to apply. These 

courses, he said, reflected “the best literature…the 

best and most practical thought” (State of 

Connecticut 1902b, 125). To those who questioned 

the teaching of subjects other than agriculture (e.g., 

engineering, horticulture, business) Stimson said: 

“If you have five boys on your farm, and you have 

a farm that will not support more than one when 

you are through with it, what are you going to do 

with the other four?” (State of Connecticut 1902b, 

122). 

 

Stimson’s Curriculum Goes Public 

Stimson reported to the trustees at the end 

of 1901 that radical changes and readjustments to 

the curriculum had been made and apologized for 

the delay in printing the next year’s catalogue, 

which typically appeared in the same volume 

(State of Connecticut 1902a, 9). When the 1901-

1902 catalogue arrived, it included a detailed 

description of the college’s “newly organized 

courses of study” which “embraced the sciences 

that bear directly on practical agriculture” as well 

as “general culture studies” (e.g., mathematics, 

English, German, ethics, drawing, civics) to guard 

against over specialization. The catalogue 

emphasized that students were free to choose any 

course for which they had “special liking and 

aptitude” and could expect to be associated with 

students “as earnest” as themselves (Connecticut 

Agricultural College 1902, 39). The catalogue 

argued: 

  

Provision has been made for the young 

men and young women to desire to return 

to the farms; and for those, also, who 

desire to go into civil engineering, 

business, teaching, or some one of the 

other leading pursuits or professions. 

(Connecticut Agricultural College 1902, 

39)  

 

Although the courses overlapped 

considerably, they were classified separately in the 

catalogue to more clearly show that the college 

provided education “to meet the needs of students 

of different grades of preliminary training and of 

distinctly different prospective callings” 

(Connecticut Agricultural College 1902, 40). The 

courses sent a clear message to the citizens of 

Connecticut that Connecticut Agricultural College 

remained steadfastly committed to agricultural 

education. It would be difficult to argue, based on 

the courses outlined in the catalogue, that Stimson 



 

47 
 

had dropped agriculture to a secondary place in the 

curriculum as his predecessor G. W. Flint had.  

The college’s longer agricultural courses 

were now listed as “Preparation for Farming” 

courses. There were three of them: a four-year 

farming course for common school graduates and 

separate two-year farming courses for students 

with and without a high school education. In all, 

there were nearly thirty courses—four-year, two-

year, twelve-week, ten-week, and ten-day 

courses—specifically designed to meet the needs 

of farmers and their families, including short 

courses on a variety of agricultural, industrial, and 

domestic topics (e.g., poultry production, 

blacksmithing, table service) open to men and 

women fifteen years of age or older (Connecticut 

Agricultural College 1902, 40, 58-68). In addition, 

a new four-year Bachelor of Science degree course 

on “Preparation for Agricultural Teaching, 

Experiment Station Work, or Work in the U.S.  

 

Department of Agriculture” was available  

(Connecticut Agricultural College 1902, 40). The 

four-year Bachelor of Agriculture degree had been 

abolished.  

 

Stimson’s Curriculum Goes Visual 

The catalogue for the following year, 1902-

1903, included a print diagram of Stimson’s 

curriculum which was circulated widely by the 

college and used by Stimson personally in his 

public and professional addresses (Connecticut 

Agricultural College 1902, 40, 58-63, Stimson 

1939, 27). The diagram (Figure 1) helped the 

college argue that it provided education to meet the 

needs of many different kinds of students. It also 

signaled that Connecticut Agricultural College 

valued the same curricular principles as the other-

land grant colleges: breadth, depth, balance, and 

choice (Stemmons 1931, 112-114, AAACES 

1907a, 87). 

 

  
 

Figure 1: Curriculum and courses of study, 1902 



48 
 

Stimson modeled the six-year curriculum 

after the Ontario Agricultural College in Guelph, 

Canada (Stimson and Lathrop 1954, 585). The first 

two years served as a general education 

preparatory program for students who came to the 

college from the common schools to pursue a four-

year course in farming, mechanic arts, general 

science, business, or housekeeping, the last of 

which was typically branded by land-grant 

colleges as ‘domestic science’ to make the subject 

appear more technical. The work in these first two 

years was the same for all students: a blend of 

general culture studies, elementary/secondary 

science, basic agriculture, and military drill—a 

subject required by the land-grant acts. 

The middle two years, years three and four, 

were the practical unit. Each course now had a 

separate schedule, and in year four students in the 

general farming course elected either dairying or 

horticulture as a concentration. High school 

graduates and qualified others could enter directly 

  

into the practical unit and graduate in two years. 

Stimson called years three and four the “great 

years” at the college due to their success at 

preparing students for farming and other “practical 

operations” (State of Connecticut 1907, 11) or, if 

they elected to continue their studies elsewhere, 

degree courses at top-tier institutions such as 

Cornell, Massachusetts Agricultural College, and 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (AAACES 

1907a, 88, Stimson 1939, 25-26). The last two 

years of the six-year curriculum were the 

professional unit. To earn a Bachelor of Science 

degree students were required to complete the 

professional unit, two additional two years of 

college level coursework, years five and six for 

students who entered the college directly from the 

common schools. 

The six-year curriculum remained 

relatively unchanged for the first five years of 

Stimson’s presidency. In 1906, a revised 

curriculum and diagram appeared (Figure 2). 

 
 

Figure 2: Curriculum and courses of study, 1906 



49 
 

The two-year secondary business course 

had been replaced by a two-year course in 

preparation for teaching nature study in rural 

schools. This revision likely reflects the rising 

popularity of nature study among teachers and 

public interest in correlating nature study and 

agricultural education (Eddy 1956, 60-61, 

Williams 1991, 182). It most certainly reflects the 

fact that Stimson’s summer school for teachers had 

become the most popular course at the college. The 

1906 summer school enrolled eighty-four teachers 

from Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, and 

New Jersey—two more than all of the students 

enrolled in the college’s six years of regular 

courses combined at that time (Connecticut 

Agricultural College 1907, 111-113). Graduates of 

the summer school proved to be among the 

college’s strongest advocates (AAACES 1907b, 

71). It would have benefitted the college greatly to 

have these teachers enrolled in its regular courses. 

Connecticut Agricultural College was not the only 

land-grant college to find itself training public 

school teachers at this time, although providing 

this educational service was not part of the original 

design (Ross 1969, 135).  

In other changes, an elective option in 

poultry was added for fourth year students in the 

general farming course and the Bachelor of 

Science degree course options were reduced from 

five (agriculture, horticulture, engineering, home 

economics, general science) to two (agriculture 

and home economics). The degree course changes 

appear not to have impacted many students as there 

were only two enrolled in the fifth and sixth years 

at the college at that time (AAACES 1907b, 71). 

This revision may have been undertaken to 

reemphasize the college’s commitment to 

agricultural education, which is how Stimson used 

the diagram in his report to the board of trustees in 

1906 (State of Connecticut 1907, 10). For Stimson, 

the diagram also represented a compact exhibit of 

how he had adapted the land-grant idea to local 

conditions in Connecticut (AAACES 1907a, 87).  

 

Stimson Wins the Approval of Farmers and 

Saves the College 

Stimson’s curriculum development and 

promotion activities were immediately successful 

at reversing farmers’ opinion of the college. As the 

education provided by the college became better 

known demand for it increased. By the end of 

1902, the Connecticut Pomological Society and 

Connecticut Editorial Association had reversed 

their previous positions and endorsed the college 

after visits to inspect its facilities and farm, visits 

hosted by Stimson himself (Stemmons 1931, 113). 

Regarding the Connecticut Pomological Society 

visit, the Hartford Daily Courant reported: 

 

The members expressed themselves as 

well pleased with the work of the college 

under the new management and the result 

of the meeting will undoubtedly result in 

placing the college in a better standing 

with the farmers about the state. (Field 

Meeting at Storrs 1902, 8) 

 

Stimson reported to the trustees in 1902 that forty-

four new students had been admitted that year, 

bringing the total enrollment at the college, 

including winter and summer schools, to 152 

(State of Connecticut 1903, 7). These numbers far 

exceeded the college’s rooming capacity. Stimson 

wrote to the Hartford Daily Courant on September 

30, 1903 that due to high enrollment numbers some 

boys were forced to live outside and in the 

president’s house and “it may be necessary to do 

away with the short courses” (C. A. C. Opening 

1903, 3). Readers must have feared a return to the 

disarray of the Flint administration and farmers the 

loss of profitable training opportunities.  

 By the end of 1903, enrollment was over 

200 as demand for longer courses and short winter 



 

50 
 

courses continued to grow (State of Connecticut 

1904, 8). Stimson used this opportunity to mobilize 

the Connecticut State Grange, who joined him in 

securing $65,000 for a new brick and stone 

dormitory and $50,000 for a new horticultural 

building and greenhouses from the state legislature 

(Stimson 1939, 28, 1909, 2). It was clear that the 

Connecticut State Grange was now on Stimson’s 

side. In March 1903 Grange Master B. C. Atterson 

argued before the Connecticut General Assembly:  

 

The institution has passed through some 

serious times but the tide has turned and 

how the institution is heading in the right 

direction…. The farmers are more and 

more appreciating this college and the 

work it does. I believe it needs help from 

the state and I believe such help ought to 

be given it. (cited in Sorber 2015, 75) 

 

Stimson obliged, telling farmers that he 

appreciated the fact that the college was “the 

offspring of the Connecticut State Grange” 

(President Stimson of C. A. C. 1905, 11). All of 

these positive developments were reported in the 

press. Additional state appropriations and private 

gifts followed (Stimson 1909). Stimson attributed 

his success at Connecticut Agricultural College to 

“the practical working through a period of years of 

our industrial courses of secondary grade—courses 

to which the Connecticut community instantly and 

heartily responded” (Stimson 1909, 3). Stimson 

fixed the subjects and hours for these courses 

himself (Stimson 1909, 2). 

Stimson left Connecticut Agricultural 

College in 1908 to become director of Smith’s 

Agricultural School in Northampton, 

Massachusetts, the first permanent public 

secondary school of agriculture in the state. Upon 

his departure, the trustees of Connecticut 

Agricultural College passed a resolution 

acknowledging his exceptional service to the 

college and the state. At Smith’s Agricultural 

School, Stimson developed his ideas around 

cooperative extension and applied them to 

vocational agricultural education at the secondary 

level, work that has attracted the attention of 

historians of curriculum, vocational education, and 

agricultural education (Kliebard 2004, Moore 

1988, Roberts and Harlin 2007, Smith and 

Rayfield 2016). As this paper suggests, his 

contributions to Connecticut Agricultural 

College—now the University of Connecticut—and 

the early history of land-grant colleges are just as 

significant. 

  

Conclusion 

The curriculum and courses of study 

developed by Stimson during his tenure as 

president of Connecticut Agricultural College 

provides insight into a critical early stage in the 

history of land-grant colleges when short courses 

and specialized programs were used to build 

support among farmers and rural communities for 

institutional and curricular expansion. By 

developing the college’s practical courses 

offerings, creating a new summer school for rural 

school teachers, and maintaining the most 

intensely agricultural curriculum of any land-grant 

college in the country (Stemmons 1931, 117), 

Stimson managed to win the respect and approval 

of Connecticut farmers, which he leveraged to 

increase state appropriations. Under Stimson’s 

leadership, Connecticut Agricultural College 

provides a case of a land-grant college in New 

England that became more liberal and scientific by 

becoming more practical.      

 

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