History of Soil Science at Oregon State University

Soils research and teaching were an early component of activities in the Oregon Agricultural College before the School of Agriculture was formed in 1881. Courses and research reports on drainage, soil chemistry and soil fertility are listed in the 1870s. By the early 1900s several soils courses were offered.

In 1909 a Division of Drainage and Irrigation was formed within the Department of Agronomy, when W. L. Powers joined the Department. In 1916 this Division became a separate Department of Drainage and Irrigation with Professor Powers as its Head. Perhaps the first course in the U. S. in irrigation farming was offered to agricultural students. Specialization in soil irrigation and drainage was provided after 1914. The Department of Agronomy became the Department of Soils and Farm Management in 1916, the year C. V. Ruzek joined the Department. In 1918 the soils part and the Department of Drainage and Irrigation were merged into the Department of Soils, with four faculty members and Powers as Head. In the 1960s the name was changed to the Department of Soil Science. The first Ph.D. in soils was granted in 1935, one of the first four at Oregon State.

Professor Ruzek, who taught beginning soils until his retirement in 1954, was remarkable for his ability to remember students’ names, where they came from, and stories about their fathers, uncles and neighbors. The courses in soils are remembered more fondly by the students in retrospect than while they were taking them. Until the 1950s drainage, irrigation and soil chemistry/soil fertility were the strong research programs. Field trials on subsoiling, liming, sulphur were a major component. Extension soils work was developed from the early days in the Agronomy Department, and through the land reclamation and settlement programs in the 1930s and ‘40s with Art King.

Soils research provided an understanding of soils in Oregon and in the western United States. Before the turn of the century, trials were underway on subsoiling, a practice still being debated on whether the benefits exceed the costs. Sulfur was established as a necessary amendment for legumes in the early 1900s, and subsequently for many crops in both eastern and western Oregon. In one of the first uses of a fertilizer in the field, elemental sulfur was used as a fertilizer in western and in central Oregon and later in southern Oregon around 1912. Soil surveys concentrated on proposed reclamation projects in Oregon, cooperating with the Bureau of Reclamation to advise settlers on farming practices in specific areas.

The Department has been a leader in forest soils work, starting with a course in the 1930s and becoming a full program in 1952 with the appointment of Chet Youngberg. This program trained most of the early people working in forest soils in the Northwest, and established the importance of the land base for the forest industry.

Members of the Department have contributed to international work in soils. The Department was involved in the early Oregon State work in Thailand and in Turkey, and continues with present international agriculture projects in Africa. From a pre-1940s number of four, the soils staff consisted of about six people until H. B. (Ace) Cheney came as Head of the Department in 1952. The Department expanded rapidly in the next 10 years to its present size of about 14 people. In the third quarter of the century a full range of soils education, research and extension activities were carried on, including field experiments in crop production, soil testing, irrigation and drainage, clay mineralogy especially of volcanic soils, soil genesis and classification in cooperation with USDA, forest soils in cooperation with the School of Forestry, and soil microbiology in cooperation with the Department of Microbiology.

In 1978, Benno Warkentin came as Department Head. The soils programs continued with greater emphasis on soil biology and biochemistry, and on biogeochemical processes in soil.

In 1990 the Departments of Crop Science and Soil Science were merged, with Sheldon Ladd, and since 2000 Russ Karow, as Department Head. Soils activity remains strong, with new faculty members developing programs to meet new needs of crop production, biosolids management, landscape studies, soil quality, soil biology, water quality and ecosystem studies in Oregon.

Prepared by B. P. Warkentin
From material in the OSU archives
and recent changes.
January, 2002