Voices from the Field Liberty Hyde Bailey

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When Liberty Hyde Bailey accepted a position as professor of horticulture at the Michigan College of Agriculture in 1884, his mentor, botanist Asa Gray, warned him against the move. His shift from the study of botany to the field of horticulture would be a step away from higher science, and would likely mean a slip into professional obscurity. Those predictions could not have been more wrong. Moving from Michigan to a position as professor of horticulture at Cornell in 1888, Bailey embarked on a brilliant career as educator, researcher, writer, extension advocate, and university administrator that established his reputation as one of the most influential plant scientists of the 20th century.
Bailey spent his Michigan childhood helping to tend his father’s orchard, and exploring the fields and forests around the family farm. He trained at Michigan Agricultural College (now Michigan State University) and worked for a time in Gray’s lab at Harvard University before coming to Cornell, where he quickly established a reputation for great teaching and prolific experimentation. In the course of his lifetime he published hundreds of papers and dozens of books—many of which are considered classics in horticultural science and remain in print to this day. He played a prominent role in promoting the formal study of botany in the United States, helping to establish the Botanical Society of America in the late 19th century. Working closely with Dean of Agriculture Isaac Roberts, Bailey worked tirelessly to strengthen Cornell’s effectiveness in disseminating knowledge to New York’s farmers. His advocacy for this mission won over the New York State legislature, and it was during his tenure as Dean of Agriculture at Cornell—a post he had assumed after Roberts’ retirement in 1903—that construction on the State College of Agriculture at Cornell began.
While Bailey’s achievements as scientist, educator, and administrator were great and many, it’s been suggested that Bailey himself was most proud of his contributions to the world as humanist and advocate of a life ethic that included a profound respect for nature. During his years at Cornell Bailey passionately nurtured the teaching of nature study. In retirement he wrote the book, The Holy Earth (1915)—recently released as a centenary edition with a foreword by environmental philosopher Wendell Berry. “Dominion does not carry personal ownership.” wrote Bailey. “There are many generations of folk yet to come after us, who will have equal rights with us to the products of the globe. It would seem a divine obligation rests on every soul. Are we to make righteous use of the vast accumulation of knowledge of the planet? If so we must have a new formulation. The partition of the earth among the millions who live on it is necessarily a question of morals, and a society that is founded on an unmoral partition and use cannot itself be righteous and whole. ” As the faculty and students of today’s Cornell grapple with new issues emerging with climate change, globalization and inequality, Bailey’s words offer guidance that is as relevant today as it was a hundred years ago.