Profiles in the History of the U.S. Soil Survey

NACTA Journal, Jun 2005 by Eash, Neal

Profiles in the History of the U.S. Soil Survey By Douglas Helms, Anne B.W. Effland, and Patricia J. Durana, Blackwell Publishing, 331 pages, 2002, hardcover, $49.99.

While the title of this book leads one to think that this text will only discuss the history of the soil survey, this book very succinctly does much more than this. This book provides a very comprehensive history of the United States soil survey as well as showing the intrinsic relationship between the soil survey and the land grant universities. The authors delicately interweave the importance of the Hatch Act and the resulting state experiment stations which provided the laboratory and support research personnel to the field soil scientists, a relationship that is as important today as it was in 1877 when the Hatch Act was passed.

It was also pleasing to see that this book covers the history of the soil survey and provides detailed reasoning for why the establishment of the soil survey and the experiment stations was so important. For example, Charles William Dabney as state chemist of the North Carolina Experiment Station (circa 1880) had a "charge to analyze fertilizers, suppress fraudulent sales of ineffective fertilizers, and investigate plant growth and nutrition and fertilizers and crops suited to particular soils." Experiment station scientists continue these objectives today.

The authors do an excellent job of discussing the nuances between soil science and geology. The influences of Curtis Marbut, K.D. Glinka, Charles Kellogg, and Guy Smith are discussed providing the scientific basis for the historic and current soil survey methods. The impact of soil geomorphology and the work of Robert Ruhe is also documented as well as the work by Leland Giles at the Desert Project. These studies represent a strong dichotomy between soil mapping and soil geomorphology, a fundamental link that was nurtured in the mid-1900's that impacted soil classification and taxonomy.

I would recommend Profiles in the History of the U.S. Soil Survey as supplementary reading for university level courses in soil genesis and classification. It is also a mandatory reference text for any soil scientist. By understanding the scientific reasoning behind the establishment of our discipline, we can better address future changes without undermining our discipline by chasing objectives that are impertinent or tangential to our branch of knowledge.

Neal Eash

Associate Professor of Soil Science

University of Tennessee