Agricultural Economics class

(Utah State University, Merill-Cazier Library, Special Collections & Archives, W. Preston Thomas collection 14.1/4 : 26 Bx. 14 Fd. 8.)

The USU Department of Agricultural Economics taught students to become articulate and effective in uniting and achieving objectives necessary for implementing successful cooperative farm enterprises.

In 1921, USU began offering courses in a newly-created program called Agricultural Economics, jointly administered by the School of Agriculture and the School of Commerce (predecessors to the College of Agriculture and the Huntsman School of Business). By the early 1930s, the college taught courses on the cooperative marketing of agricultural products. Cooperative marketing increasingly became a focus for graduate work; five Masters of Science degrees on this subject were awarded in 1948.

Faculty understood that for farmer cooperatives to be as successful as they could be, the students as future farmers needed to understand both the economics and agriculture of farming. George Blanch discussed this uniting of economy and agriculture in his broadcast on USU Radio.

Address by Stanford Cazier to the Utah Farm Bureau Federation at the Marriott Hotel in Salt Lake City, Utah, on 16 November 1984 [Click image to enlarge; click it again to browse all pages.]

(Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library, Special Collections & Archives, University Archives 3.8:43 no. 17.)

The same year that Utah State Agricultural College became Utah State University (1957), Agricultural Economics moved wholly under the College of Agriculture’s administration. The program remained there until 1976 when it once again became jointly administered by the Colleges of Agriculture and Business. The curriculum expanded in the 1980s to include courses on consumer and worker cooperatives. These were taught by two former Aggies who returned to Logan as economics professors: DeeVon Bailey, an extension specialist in agricultural markets and rural industry; and Gary B. Hansen, a specialist in worker cooperatives. In May 2008, Agricultural Economics moved back to the College of Agriculture where it now functions as part of the Department of Applied Economics.