Abstract
Since 1840, when Justus von Liebig published his most influential book, Chemistry and Its Applications to Agriculture and Physiology, he has justifiably held a reputation as one of the nineteenth century’s most significant agricultural chemists. In recent years, historians have placed Liebig in a context which emphasizes not only the importance of his chemical discoveries, but also the impact of those ideas on the economics and societies of the German states and other nations.1 However, an issue that was very important to Liebig’s contemporaries should not be overlooked: his position as a leader in both the science of chemistry and its applications to agriculture. Certainly no one had more influence in the nineteenth century than Liebig in encouraging scientific investigations of German agriculture. The German agricultural experiment stations, in particular, have often been seen as institutional proof that Liebig’s ideas were successfully applied to German farming.2 The world’s first state‐supported agricultural experiment station was founded near Leipzig in 1851; by the time of Liebig’s death in 1873, nearly twenty-five similar stations had been established in the German area. Throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century, German experiment stations earned an international reputation. Important discoveries in plant pathology, animal nutrition, and soil microbiology can be traced to research at the German agricultural experiment stations. For all of this, experiment station
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Notes
Mr. Finlay has taught in history departments at Iowa State University and at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
Among the most significant recent works dealing with Liebig are Margaret W. Rossiter, The Emergence of Agricultural Science: Justus von Liebig and the Americans, 1840–1860 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1975), and Peter Borscheid, Naturwissenschaft, Staat, und Industrie in Baden, 1848–1914 (Stuttgart: Klett, 1976).
Many historians have found a rather direct connection between Liebig and the agricultural experiment stations. For example, Henry R. Kraybill, borrowing from J. M. Bemmelen’s biography of the Dutch chemist, G. J. Mulder, claims: “Liebig exerted a dominant influence in impressing upon government authorities the great need of providing funds and facilities for the establishment of agricultural experiment stations.” See Kraybill’s ‘Liebig’s Influence on the Promotion of Agricultural Chemical Research’, in Forest Ray Moulton (ed.), Liebig after Liebig: A Century of Progress in Agricultural Chemistry (Washington: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1942), p. 14. W. A. Shenstone’s short biography, Justus von Liebig. His Life and Work, 1803–1873 (London: Cassel & Co., 1901), suggests that the experiment stations originated in Liebig’s teachings and influence (p. 124). Another biographer, Richard Blunck, asserts that experiment stations were the “powerful sources” for “pumping Liebig’s ideas into agriculture.” Blunck, Justus von Liebig: Die Lebens geschickte eines Chemikers (Berlin: Limpert, 1942), p. 273. H. Neubauer’s account of the experiment stations describes Liebig as the “Promotheus” who showed the need for fully equipped agricultural research facilities; Liebig’s ideas were carried out by the “apostles” who promoted agricultural experiment stations. See H. Neubauer, ‘Die landwirtschaftliche Versuchs-und Kontrolwesen in Deutschland’, Archiv des deutschen Landwirtschaftsrats 35 (1911), 177. Finally, a more recent work, Ludwig Schmitt’s ‘Justus von Liebig’, in Günther Franz and Heinz Haushofer (eds.), Grosse Landwirte (Frankfurt am Main: DLG, 1970), contends that the experiment stations were founded “directly through Liebig’s teachings” (p. 164).
The one hundredth anniversary of Stöckhardt’s death inspired two historical articles: Wolfgang Böhm, ‘Julius Adolf Stöckhardt (1809–1886): Wegbereiter der landwirtschaftlicher Versuchsstationen’, Landwirtschaftliche Forschung, 39 (1986), 1–7; and Otto Weinhaus et al., ‘Julius Adolph Stöckhardt-Ein Wegbereiter für die interdisziplinäre Arbeit, die Zusammenarbeit mit der Praxis und die Popularisierung wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnisse’, Zeitschrift für Chemie, 26 (1986), 269–275.
Julius Stöckhardt to Justus von Liebig, 8 May 1852. Liebig Museum, Giessen, No. 1645.
For an account of the Saxon agricultural leader’s influence during the founding years of the Möckern station, see my ‘The German Agricultural Experiment Stations and the Beginning of American Agricultural Research’, Agricultural History, 62 (1988), 41–50.
Georg Liebig & Reinhold Echtermeyer (eds.), Briefwechsel zwischen J. von Liebig und T. Reuning über landwirtschaftliche Fragen aus den Jahren 1854 bis 1873 (Dresden: Schönfeld, 1884). The letters cited are dated 3 August 1855, 21 December 1855, 11 February 1856, 11 April 1856, 18 March 1857. This published collection includes no responses from Liebig before 1858. Thus, it is impossible to ascertain in detail Liebig’s reaction to Reuning’s pleas. Nonetheless, Reuning’s tone and persistence imply that Liebig did not adopt the minister’s enthusiasm for the agricultural experiment stations. One Prussian Morgen, also familiar in Saxony, was equivalent to.63 English acres. Thus 200 Morgen equalled 126 acres.
Justus von Liebig, ‘Vorwort über agrikultur-chemische Versuchs-Stationen’, in Ergebnisse landwirtschaftlicher und agrikultur-chemischen Versuche an der Station des General-Comité des Bayerischen landwirtschaftlichen Vereines in Munich, No. 1 [1. Heft] (München: Cotta, 1857), vii–ix. See also (Carl) Fraas, ‘Geschichtliches’, in Ergebnisse landwirtschaftlicher und agrikultur-chemischen Versuche an der Station des Gener ai-Comité des Bayerischen landwirtschaftlichen Vereines in München, No. 1, Cotta, München, 1857. The station’s first director was one of Liebig’s former students, Wilhelm Mayer. Though the exact circumstances are unclear, there is evidence that Liebig insisted that Mayer receive the appointment. Mayer soon left that post to direct the artificial fertilizer factory at Heufeld, where Liebig was an important advisor and investor.
Liebig, ‘Vorwort über Versuchs-Stationen’, ix–xii.
Justus von Liebig to Hermann Christian Fehling, 21 October 1857. Liebig Museum, Giessen, No. 687.
Friedrich Mohr to Justus von Liebig, 18 January 1857, in W. A. Kahlbaum (ed.), Justus von Liebig und Friedrich Mohr in ihren Briefen von 1834 bis 1870: Ein Zeitbild (Leipzig: Barth, 1904), reprint edition, Leipzig: Zentralantiquariat der DDR, 1970), pp. 153–154. Liebig’s next published letter responding to Mohr was written thirty months later, and does not mention the St. Nikolas experiment station.
Ernst Theodor Stöckhardt to Justus von Liebig, 16 June 1857. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Handschriften Abteilung, Liebigiana, II.B., Ernst Stöckhardt, No. 6.
Wilhelm Crusius to Justus von Liebig, 25 August 1857. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Handschriften Abteilung, Liebigiana II.B., Crusius, No. 1.
See Richard P. Aulie, ‘The Mineral Theory’, Agricultural History 48 (1974), 369–382.
Liebig to Vieweg, 26 April 1856, in Margarete and Wolfgang Schneider (eds.), Briefe an Vieweg (Braunschweig & Wiesbaden: Vieweg, 1986), p. 307. The final comment on Wolff is from the appendix of Justus von Liebig, Die Grundsätze der Agriculturchemie mit Rücksicht auf die in England angestellten Untersuchungen (Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1855). See also Liebig’s two attacks on the nitrogen theory which appeared in the Zeitschrift für die Landwirtschaft 6 (1856): ‘Über das Verhältniβ der Chemie zur Landwirtschaft und über die agrikultur-chemischen Versuche des Herrn J. B. Lawes’, 1–39, and ‘Herr Dr. Emil Wolff und die Agriculturchemie’, 197–212.
Justus Liebig, Über die Theorie und Praxis der Landwirtschaft (Vieweg, Braunschweig, 1856), pp. 11–12, 92–96, 120–122.
Justus von Liebig to Wilhelm Knop, 21 June 1856. Liebig Museum, Giessen, No. 548. Knop directed the Möckern experiment station from 1856 to 1866, stressing the need to increase the funding and specialization of the station’s scientific work.
Julius Adolph Stöckhardt, ‘Erwiderung auf die tadelnden Urteile welche Herrn Dr. J. v. Liebig über meine agriculturchemische Thätigkeit und Richtung ausgesprochen’, Chemische Ackersmann 3 (1857), 135. Liebig’s judgement of Stöckhardt’s abilities appears in über die Theorie und Praxis der Landwirtschaft, pp. 122–126. In a 27 September 1862 letter to Vieweg, Liebig declared it was a “big step for the better” that Stöckhardt’s influence was diminishing in the early 1860s. See Schneider, M. & Schneider, W. (eds.), Briefe an Vieweg (Braunschweig, Wiesbaden: Vieweg, 1986), p. 366.
Justus von Liebig to Général-Comité des landwirtschaftlichen Vereins für Bayern in München, 4 August 1864. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Handschriften Abteilung, Liebigiana, H.A., München, landw. Verein, No. 1.
Note attached to poster of Verein für landwirtschaftliche Versuchsstationen in Bayern, 18 September 1866. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Handschriften Abteilung, Liebigiana III. C., Nr. 153. The composition of its board of directors may be a more significant indication of the group’s leanings: with the exception of one experiment station scientists, four of the five board members were required by the statute to be estate owners or practicing farmers. See ‘Die Verein für agriculturchemische Versuchs-Stationen in Bayern’, Landwirtschaftliche Versuchsstationen, 7 (1865), 155–159.
Briefwechsel zwischen Liebig und Reuning. See Liebig to Reuning, 26 June 1862 and 10 September 1862, pp. 110, 113, and Reuning to Liebig, 31 March 1861, 21 November 1861, 12 July 1862, September 1862, and 9 October 1863, pp. 60, 91, 108, 111–112, and 129–130.
Justus von Liebig, Die Chemie und ihre Anwendung auf Agrikultur und Physiologie, 8th ed. (Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1864), p. xix.
Hermann’s social and academic failures as a pharmacy student are documented in Justus von Liebig’s letters to R. Merck, 12 March 1848, 19 March 1848, 29 December 1848, 8 February 1850, 12 May 1850, 29 July 1850, and 3 May 1851. Liebig Museum, Giessen, Nos. 1012,1013, 1015, 1018, 1020, 1021, and 1023, respectively.
Biographical information from O(tto) M(ay), ‘Hermann Freiherr von Liebig’, Zeitschrift des landwirtschaftlichen Vereins in Bayern 84 (1894), 723–725; and Adolph Kohut, Justus von Liebig: Sein Leben und Wirken, auf Grund der besten und zuverlässigsten Quellen geschildert, Roth, Giessen, 1894.
The article in question was first published in the Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, No. 65, Supplement [Beilage] (1867), 1061–1062; and also printed anonymously in the Agronomische Zeitung 22 (1867): 216–218. It was attributed to Justus von Liebig in Andreas Kleinert (ed.), Justus von Liebig, ‘Hochwohlgeborner Freiherr’: Die Briefe an Georg von Cotta und die anonymen Beiträge zur Augsburger Allgemeinen Zeitung (Mannheim, Heidelberg, & Vienna: Bionomica, Winter, Braumüller, 1979), pp. 48–52.
Hermann von Liebig, ‘Die agrikulturchemischen Versuchsstationen’, Agronomische Zeitung 23 (1868): 667–668, 699. Several of his other publications give similar interpretations.
H. v. Liebig, Anwendung der künstlichen Dünger, nebst einem Anhang: über Versuchswirtschaften als Ergänzung der Versuchsstationen, Vieweg, Braunschweig, 1867. Cf. Briefwechsel zwischen Liebig und Reuning (20 Jan. 1861), 56.
Hermann von Liebig, ‘Agriculturchemie und Landwirtschaft auf der Hochschule’, Georgika 4 (1873), 1–26.
Hermann von Liebig, Anwendung der künstlichen Dünger, 48; Justus von Liebig, “Vorwort”, xi.
Still useful in this regard is Fritz Mosziek, Der Einfluss Liebigs auf die landwirtschaftliche Theorie und Praxis, Inaug. Diss., Jena, 1896, (Berlin: Boll, 1896).
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Finlay, M.R. (1991). Science and Practice in German Agriculture: Justus Von Liebig, Hermann Von Liebig, and the Agricultural Experiment Stations. In: Woodward, W.R., Cohen, R.S. (eds) World Views and Scientific Discipline Formation. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol 134. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3164-3_28
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