How science turned California into the country’s top farming state
Before California became the nation’s go-to state for the food on your plate, growing crops here was a challenge. After the Gold Rush ended, former miners shifted their picks to plows. But could they really have more luck with crops on such dry land?
That’s where the University of California entered the picture. One of its first professors was soil expert Eugene Hilgard, who left Michigan to take up the new challenge of helping California farmers.
Analyzing soil samples sent to him from Californians across the young state, Hilgard experimented to find the right techniques for leaching salt from the alkali soils to make the land productive. He and his UC colleagues helped farmers figure out what to grow, where, and laid the foundations for the state’s future as America’s premier wine-growing region.
Using the power of science to make new land productive boosted American prosperity, and Congress passed the Hatch Act in 1887 to support agricultural research. UC still works closely with farmers today, funded by the federal government via the Hatch Act and through the Smith-Lever Act for Cooperative Extension, which brings the latest crops and scientific developments into our fields, orchards and ranches.
An agricultural laboratory at UC Berkeley used by Hilgard, his students and colleagues, from William Carey Jones’ “Illustrated History of the University of California, 1868-1895.” Courtesy Collectible Ivy
The fruits of their labor