MASSEY COLLEGE

Taranaki Daily News, 6 December 1929, Page 16

MASSEY COLLEGE

FOUNDATION STONE LAID

EPOCH-MAKING EVENT.

ADVANCE IN AGRICULTURE.

Another forward step in agricultural education and research in the Dominion was made at Palmerston North on Wednesday, when’.His Excellency the Gov-ernor-General (Sir ,Charles Fergusson) laid the foundation-stone of the projected block of buildings at Massey Agricultural College. His Excellency, who. was accompanied by Lady Alice Fergusson, was conducted through the dairy research laboratories, and after the stone had been laid the Governor-General inspected the site and the college factory. The new buildings are oh a site set high on a rise at the foot of the bush-clad hills that roll away to the Tararua range, and the scene as His Excellency declared the stone /‘well and truly laid’’ was a memorable one.

RECOGNITION OF AGRICULTURE.

“The occasion of our gathering to-day is a very important one in the history of New Zealand,” said the chairman of the College Council (Sir Geo. Fowlds). “I am of the opinion that historians of the years from to-day will point to the establishment of this Agricultural College as one of the epochmaking events in the history of our country. It marks a forward movement in the recognition of agriculture as the foundation of our material prosperity and the inclusion of the agriculturist as a member of a learned profession,, a profession which deserves and requires the highest training and equipment which science and research can give it. The establishment of this college makes another and very important advance in the educational life of New Zealand, namely, the voluntary coming together of tho university colleges in Auckland and Wellington for the promotion of scientific agricultural education and research. This union has produced such beneficial results which means the submergence of some old provincial prejudices that it deserves consideration. I hope and believe it will lead to further co-operation and co-ordination in the wide field of university education, and possible mean at an early date the establishment of the university of north New Zealand.

“An agricultural college, in order to function at its highest, must provide for its students a certain amount of cultural education, and I anticipate a time, although I may not live to sec it, when there will be grouped around this building, the foundation stone of which His Excellency will presently lay, training colleges for teachers where they will imbibe the agricultural atmosphere which will better enable them to pass on to children of the primary schools a bias in favour of agricultural pursuits upon which.the prosperity of the country must mainly depend for many years to come.

A VISION OF THE FUTURE.

“I also hope and expect that before many years pass .by there will be a branch of the college giving a full and complete course of domestic science,” continued Sir George. “The wives of the farmers of the future deserve the highest training we can give them for the discharge of their important duties, and nowhere could the right atmosphere be better provided than at the agricultural college where their future husbands are being trained. In short, we anticipate that in the coming years around the campus of this college there will develop various educational institutions that will make Palmerston North the Oxford and Cambridge of New Zealand, an Oxford or Cambridge adequately adapted to furnish the educational needs of this Dominion.- This college will give a scientific training not only to a large number of the future farmers of New Zealand but it will be expected also to provide scientifically trained men for educational purposes, for experts in various branches of the Agricultural Department, for the management and control of large businesses supplying the varied wants of the 'farmers and for scientific research. The speaker stated that the field for scientifically trained men in various branches of agriculture and for research workers was almost unlimited.

i He then briefly outlined the history of the college and its present staffing, stating that it was anticipated that next year well over 200 students would be enrolled, as against 85 in the first year. “So far we have been greatly hampered by inadequate and temporary accommodation and .equipment, but when the present building programme is completed and a commodious hostel is provided, which we are expecting the Minister of Agriculture to provide as soon as possible, then this will be the most complete agricultural college in the British Empire south of the Equator.

MORE AND MORE SCIENCE.

“We have arrived at a time in New Zealand when we are relying more and more on science in- the advancement of our farming industry,” declared the Hon. G. W. Forbes during the course of a brief address. The event that day gave recognition to the fact that the farming industry was one that required assistance in regard to education and science to a greater degree than ever before. “New Zealand requires education and science for the progress of its primary industry and cannot rely on practices or experiences of the past,” he said. “We have to make a special study and train men for the work, as our production is steadily mounting. I can assure you of steady progress in production not only in the dairy industry generally but also per acre, which is one of the soundest tests. Closer stocking of land, however, meant that more problems such as diseases arose. I have been farming for nearly 40 years and I know research can accomplish a great deal.”

RESEARCH AND ECONOMICS.

The college principal, Professor G. S. Peren, stated that they were looking forward to the accommodation the new building would provide. For two years and a°half they had been struggling to establish the institution under temporary and cramped accommodation. However, judging by enrolments, the work had not suffered. “The country will perhaps wake up after we .have <rone into occupation and find that overnight a large institution has grown up,” he said. He waa pleased to see that New Zealand was really seriously backing up agricultural education. The day had passed when agricultural science

was looked on as black magic. In these days of better and more involved farming men must have, in addition to practical experience, much technical information.”

Referring to research work, the speaker said that the w r ork was tremendously handicapped by the fact that agriculture and farming as a business proposition could only be carried on with light overhead expenses. Solutions to problems must be cheap and sufficiently simple for their application under rough a ! nd ready field conditions. “We could give the answer to many problems tomorrow if it were not for the economic aspect,” he declared. “We are trying to seek cheap and foolproof solutions.” It was, to his mind, extraordinarily vital that the people of New Zealand should make sure that agriculture was a reasonably paying proposition. Unless agriculture as a basis yielded reasonable returns it was not going to draw brains and capital. “We must have our share of the best young men in the country,” said Professor Peren. AN APPROPRIATE TOOL.

His Excellency accepted from Mr. Andrew Fletcher, on behalf of the builders, a beautifully carved Maori ko, an implement which was used by the Maoris to dig kumeras. Mr. Fletcher stated that as the institution was of such a practical nature it was thought appropriate that His Excellency should use a tool of common toil.

Sir Charles Fergusson hoped that the establishment of such a college would give an immense impetus to agriculture. One of the things that had been forced upon him everywhere he had been had been the insistent cry of “Back to the land.” The land seems to be the last thing that New Zealand boys think of,” he said. “That seems very melancholy to me.” Of course, the work was hard, but .New Zealand was a monument of hard work of early pioneers. Surely the New r Zealand of the future was not going to decline because the rising generation was afraid of hard work. That did not appeal to him one bit. The college was going to encourage young people to go on the land, and that was one of the reasons it gavj? him such great pleasure to be present.

AN AGRICULTURIST GOVERNOR.

“I would like to say,” he concluded, referring to Lord Bledisloe, “that you have coming to you a new GovernorGeneral who will be everything towards you as regards the land. He is, I suppose, the first agricultural expert, not only in theory, but, what is more important, in practice, in the United Kingdom, and he will bring to you a mind trained in the science of agriculture. He will, I am sure, be able to fill a place in New Zealand that no other GovernorGeneral has yet been able to do.”. His Excellency then placed in a cavity below a stone a sealed copper receptacle containing copies of all the daily papers in Palmerston North, Wellington, and Auckland, copies of the current calendars of Massey College, Victoria College, and Auckland College, as well as a copy of the first Massey College calendar, a copy of Sir George Fowlds’ speech, and various coins of the realm. The sinking into place of the stone of Peterhead granite and the declaration by His Excellency that it had been well and truly laid brought to a close an historic ceremony.