Plant Pathology Department celebrates 50th anniversary
The Department of Plant Pathology enjoys a sterling reputation across the nation and, indeed, around the world, says Dr. James Moyer, department head. Yet the department is not particularly well known in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences or on the N.C. State University campus.
But perhaps that will change now that the department has published its history. Completed late in 2008, the history, titled From Laboratory to the Field, celebrates the department’s 50th anniversary.
While the Department of Plant Pathology was created in 1958, Moyer points out that plant pathology has been a part of the College and N.C. State since at least 1900, and From Laboratory to the Field does not confine itself solely to the half century the department has been in existence. In addition to publication of the history, a two-day celebration is planned this March to observe the 50th anniversary. The celebration will include a banquet and a scientific meeting.
The history was written largely by Clay Griffith, a Raleigh area free-lance writer and adjunct history instructor at Meredith College. Dr. Paul Peterson, official historian of the American Phytopathological Society, and Dr. Turner Sutton, professor and Plant Pathology Department Extension leader, edited the book. Peterson is also an adjunct faculty member at Clemson University and Coker College in South Carolina and the E.C. Stakman Visiting Scholar at the University of Minnesota.
Work on From Laboratory to the Field began in the late 1990s; the first draft was produced in 2002 or 2003, Moyer says. The late Dr. C. Lee Campbell, a faculty member, initiated the project, while former department head Dr. O.W. Barnett encouraged it. Moyer credits Sutton with moving the project forward so it could be completed in conjunction with the department’s 50th year.
Among N.C. State Plant Pathology highlights:
The 1945 release of Oxford 26, a flue-cured tobacco variety resistant to Granville wilt, a devastating disease at the time. Plant pathologists tended to be jacks-of-more-than-one-trade in those early days, and T.E. Smith, credited with developing Oxford 26, did some plant breeding as well as plant disease work. Moyer says Oxford 26 demonstrated the value of agricultural programs. He calls it, “The beginning of recognition of the Agricultural Experiment Station by the state legislature.”
Also notable is the leadership of Drs. Charles J. Nusbaum and Joseph N. Sasser in establishing the department in the 1950s as a center of excellence in plant nematology. “We were clearly the leading institution,” says Sutton. In the 1970s and ’80s, nematology became international in scope as Sasser and Dr. Hedwig Triantaphyllou used a U.S. Agency for International Development program to bring nematology to developing countries.
The Plant Disease Clinic was established in the 1951. Entomology joined in the 1960s, and it became the Plant Disease and Insect Clinic.
A number of early faculty members had what Moyer calls “a bent for administration” while others were successful in attracting grants to the department. That continues to be the case today. Moyer points out that the department led the college for the last six or seven years in attracting extramural funding and one year led the university.
By 1970, the N.C. State plant pathology program was the largest in the world, if you include USDA faculty, Moyer says. Through the 1980s and ’90s, department leaders made a conscious effort to develop a program that balanced basic and applied research. Today the department is among the largest in the nation, one of only a few comprehensive programs and among the top three graduate programs in the country.
Not bad for a 50-year-old.
— Dave Caldwell
But perhaps that will change now that the department has published its history. Completed late in 2008, the history, titled From Laboratory to the Field, celebrates the department’s 50th anniversary.
While the Department of Plant Pathology was created in 1958, Moyer points out that plant pathology has been a part of the College and N.C. State since at least 1900, and From Laboratory to the Field does not confine itself solely to the half century the department has been in existence. In addition to publication of the history, a two-day celebration is planned this March to observe the 50th anniversary. The celebration will include a banquet and a scientific meeting.
The history was written largely by Clay Griffith, a Raleigh area free-lance writer and adjunct history instructor at Meredith College. Dr. Paul Peterson, official historian of the American Phytopathological Society, and Dr. Turner Sutton, professor and Plant Pathology Department Extension leader, edited the book. Peterson is also an adjunct faculty member at Clemson University and Coker College in South Carolina and the E.C. Stakman Visiting Scholar at the University of Minnesota.
Work on From Laboratory to the Field began in the late 1990s; the first draft was produced in 2002 or 2003, Moyer says. The late Dr. C. Lee Campbell, a faculty member, initiated the project, while former department head Dr. O.W. Barnett encouraged it. Moyer credits Sutton with moving the project forward so it could be completed in conjunction with the department’s 50th year.
Among N.C. State Plant Pathology highlights:
The 1945 release of Oxford 26, a flue-cured tobacco variety resistant to Granville wilt, a devastating disease at the time. Plant pathologists tended to be jacks-of-more-than-one-trade in those early days, and T.E. Smith, credited with developing Oxford 26, did some plant breeding as well as plant disease work. Moyer says Oxford 26 demonstrated the value of agricultural programs. He calls it, “The beginning of recognition of the Agricultural Experiment Station by the state legislature.”
Also notable is the leadership of Drs. Charles J. Nusbaum and Joseph N. Sasser in establishing the department in the 1950s as a center of excellence in plant nematology. “We were clearly the leading institution,” says Sutton. In the 1970s and ’80s, nematology became international in scope as Sasser and Dr. Hedwig Triantaphyllou used a U.S. Agency for International Development program to bring nematology to developing countries.
The Plant Disease Clinic was established in the 1951. Entomology joined in the 1960s, and it became the Plant Disease and Insect Clinic.
A number of early faculty members had what Moyer calls “a bent for administration” while others were successful in attracting grants to the department. That continues to be the case today. Moyer points out that the department led the college for the last six or seven years in attracting extramural funding and one year led the university.
By 1970, the N.C. State plant pathology program was the largest in the world, if you include USDA faculty, Moyer says. Through the 1980s and ’90s, department leaders made a conscious effort to develop a program that balanced basic and applied research. Today the department is among the largest in the nation, one of only a few comprehensive programs and among the top three graduate programs in the country.
Not bad for a 50-year-old.
— Dave Caldwell