The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, July 5, 1917, Page 13

LADD ASKED TO QUIT North Dakota Regents Demand Resignation of Farmers’ Man Now Head of Agricultural College— Anti-Farmer Gang at Last Shows Its Hand BY HERBERT E. GASTON ‘(From the Fargo Courier-News, July 2, 19117.) } HE defiant - announcement of § Messrs. Scow and Power, members of the state board of regents, that they will re- fusge to retire from office today, sounds the call for a fight to the finish against the political group which is determined to rule the state institutions of North Dakota and to overthrow men who have given their lives to unselfish service to the people of thig state. Chief among the men who have been marked for downfall by President Lewis F. Crawford and his satellites on the board of regents is Dr. Edwin ¥. Ladd, president of the North Dakota Agricultural college. In a lifetime of fighting against food adulteration in which he has been the friend of every man, woman and child in the United States and in which he has made him- - self nationally famous, and in years of courageous campaigning to get justice for the farmer in the marketing of his products Dr. Ladd has made powerful enemies, men who will stop at nothing to overthrow him. These enemies now are acting through the state board of regents to bring about his removal from his post at the-Agricultural col- lege. This is not mere speculation nor suspicion. It is fact. The state board of regents within the last few weeks at a meeting at which three members were present openly demanded of Dr. Ladd when he appeared before them that he present his resignation. SUSPEND EFFORT TO GET RESIGNATION ‘When Dr. Ladd boldly faced the regents and told them that he would never resign, but that he would go down fighting if he must go down, the members of the board made no further effort to force him to deliver his resig- nation. > They are believed to be awaiting the result of their effort to extend the tenure of office of the two men whose terms haye expired before going ahead with their announced determination to %clean up” the agricultural college. From various sources within the past few days there have been hints that the members of the board or reg- ents were willing to compromise with Dr. Ladd. One story is that if Dr. Ladd had been willing to appoint Charles Brewer, now secretary of the board of regents, to the post of acting food commissioner of the state, the board would have abandoned its plan to force Dr. Ladd out. If such a proposition actually was made to Dr. Ladd it has already been answered, for he has announced the eppointment to that position of R. E. Stallings, former state chemist of Georgia, an expert in food regulation. Brewer, said to have been slated for this position, knows nothing about food inspection work. He is a former news- paper man and hanger-on of the poli- tical gang which for years has dictated or sought to dictate the affairs of the state of North Dakota. LIST OF THE MEN SLATED FOR THE AX The particular crisis which brought about the demand for Dr. Ladd’s resig- nation arose over his loyalty to and championship of men upon the college faculty who have proved themselves: to be the friends of all the people of the state and unwilling to bow their necks in subserviency to the -ruling political gang. Prominent among these men are the following, each one of whom the board has attempted to cause Dr, Ladd to © dismigs: Henry L. Bolley, botanist at the college, one of the pioneers at the institution and a scientist of world ‘reputation. Alfred G. Arvold, head of the public speaking department of the college, father of the Little Coun- try Theater, -one of the greatest forward ‘movements ' in rural life the nation has known in this gen- eration. Clare B. Waldron, dean of the school of agriculture and profes- sor of horticulture and forestry, ‘also one of the pioneers of the “college. = : Edward S. Keene, dean of the school of engineering, which the board of regents has been anxious to abolish, removing all engineer- ing work to the state university. LADD REFUSES TO BOW.DOWN TO REGENTS - ‘When Dr. Ladd was appointed presi- dent of the college in February of 1916 after President John H. Worst had been summarily dismissed because he would not humble himself before the regents it was freely predicted by those who knew something about what had been going on behind the scenes that he would either yield to the demand of the regents for a “house cleaning” at the college or that he would have to g0 before many months had passed. Those who may have had an idea that Dr. Ladd would yield to the reg- ents or compromise with them did not know the man who had been fighting food fakers for thirty years or more, who was one of the real leaders of the movement for pure food in the United States, the man who has not gone to bed for years without a suit for libel or damages hanging over his head because he dared to tell the people the truth. REGENTS MAKE ATTACK ON BOLLEY AND ARVOLD The regents speedily found the char- acter of the man with whom they had to deal. They started their campaign by demanding the dismissal of Profes- sor Bolley, a man who has probably done more to advance the purely agri- cultural interests of the state than any other man who has ever lived in it. Dr. Ladd refused to dismiss Professor Bolley or to discipline him in z'my way. In some way men who had worked un- der Mr. Bolley at the college were in- duced to present charges against him of conduct not consistent with scien- tific ethics. Mr. Bolley appeared before a faculty committee appointed by Dr. Ladd and proved that the men who made the charges themselves had faked evidence which they presented against Professor Bolley. The regents demand- ed that the case be reopened and themselves insisted on going over the evidence, much of it dealing with scientific matters of which they knew nothing. The regents’ committee was compell- ed to admit that these particular charges against Mr. Bolley had fallen flat. Dr. Ladd stood pat and declined to dismiss Professor Bolley, though an effort was made to have him released on the general line of attack that he was “an old fogy” and not modern in his methods, things which Mr. Bolley bad triumphantly disproved in ans- wering the charges against him. One of the next steps of the regents was an attack upon Professor Alfred G. Arvold, originator of the Little Country Theater. The regents endeav- ored to to get Dr. Ladd to alter his budget so as to make Professor Arvold a subordinate in the English depart- ment at a greatly reduced salary, knowing that of course Professor Ar- vold would not stay under such treat- ment and thus he would be removed from the college staff, WALDRON STANDS BY COLLEGE; INCURS REGENTS’ IRE Dr. Ladd rejected this attempt and insisted upon his budget standing as it was framed. The regents again yielded. The latest issue i8 over the presence of Dean Waldron in the college. It was a discussion of Dean Waldron’s place on the faculty that brought about the recent demand for Dr. Ladd’s re- signation by the regents. One of the members of the board of regents told. Dr. Ladd that Mr. Waldron had been saying things he ought not to say. He referred specifically to a speech made by Dean Waldron before the Tri-State Grain Growers’ convention in Fargo in . January this year in which he defend- ed the agricultural college against at- tacks made upon it in the recent so- . called “educational survey” carried on under the direction of the regents. The ‘argument became heated and finally one of the regents remarked that he thought Dr. Ladd had about out- lived his usefulness as president of * the college and that he ought to resign. SHOWS HOSTILITY TOWARD ALL FRIENDS OF FEOPLE 1t is significant, or at least a remark- able coincidence, that all of the men whom the regents have sought to dis- miss have been noted for conspicuous and invaluable service to the people of the nation and especially the peo- ple of North Dakota. Dr. Ladd’s great service to all the nation has been in the chemical analy- sis of foods and the setting up of food standards. He has been one of the chief leaders in a movement which has revolutionized the manufacture of food products in the United States, has com- pelled manufacturers to put out prod- ucts not injurious to health, has com- pelled them to state correctly the quantity and composition of foods and has made it possible for the consumer to buy from the grocer’s shelves without fear. He has led a fight against pa- tent medicine fakes and alcoholic nos- trums, saving hundreds of lives and practically bringing an end in this state to one of the most unholy and conscienceless traffics that the desire for ill-gotten gain ever suggested. He has met the determined opposition of some factors in business at every step. LADD’S GREAT SERVICES TO NORTH DAKOTA FARMERS To the farmers of North Dakota in particular Dr. Ladd has rendered serv- ice which has earned their everlasting gratitude. For several years past he has been investigating the milling values of wheat. His investigations have compelled millers and grain buyers reluctantly to *adjust their grades, notably in the cases of velvet chaff and durum wheats, so as to return to the farmers a price more nearly fair in comparison to the prices paid for other varieties. His latest and most sensational service in this line however, has been his recent milling tests showing the milling value of shrunken wheat of the “feed” grades to be little below that of the higher and heavier grades of wheat, though there was frequently as much as a dollar “spread” in price be- tween the two. He showed that the millers reaped their fattest profits in the milling of thigs low-grade wheat, which they mix with soft wheats from other sections of the country to make a wel-balanced flour. Dr. Ladd also has made estimates of losses by the state due to the prac- tice of shipping wheat out of the state and buying back its products, losses which in fertility to the soil and in by-products alone amount to many miillions of dollars yearly. These investigations have made for Dr. Ladd his bitterest enemies among the “old line” elevator men, the millers and their affiliated financial interests, represented by a political group in the state of North Dakota which resents any effort to get for the farmers of the state a better return for their products or anything which tends to create dis- satisfaction with any element of the present market and financial arrange- ments. HOW PROFESSOR BOLLEY DREW WRATH OF POWERS Professor Bolley’s activities have brought him into conflict with the same elements whose hostility Dr. Ladd has earned. When Professor Bol- ley worked out his wilt-resistant strain of flax and regenerated the paint in- dustry of the country, besides a num- ber of other industries depending upon flax seed and linseed oil outside busi- ness interests had no criticisms to make. The national organization of paint makers showed their gratitude by voting Professor Bolley an annual ap- propriation to be used in flax research - and they call upon him nearly every year to cross the country at their ex- pense and to talk to them about his old hobby, flax, and what can be done - with it. The continuation of their in- dustry depends upon the maintenance of the flax crop, and they depend upon Professor Bolley to keep them inform- ed about it. = Antagonism to Professor Bolley be- gan to develop when he put out his theory of ‘soil-sickness,” -a theory now generally accepted, which is that the tendency of land to “run out” when un- * der any one crop is due to the multi- plication of parasites which destroy that crop rather than to loss in fertility of the soil. It supplied the scientific reason for rotation of crops and it has saved this state millions by incul- cating better methods of farming. It was unpopular, however, because it was believed to have given the state “bad advertising” and to have hurt the sale of land and mortgages. Opposition against him concentrated PAGE THIRTEEN when he faced members of the chamber of commerce in Minneapolis one day and told them plainly that he had no sympathy with a system of grading and buying supposedly intended to en- courage the production of clean wheat, but actually designed to prevent the farmer from getting what his wheat was worth. I'rom that day the deter- mined effort to get rid of Mr. Bolley has dated. HE MAKES PEOPLE THINK, 80 ARVOLD MUST GO It is difficult for anyone to under- stand without investigation the motive for the attack upon Professor Arvold, originator of the Little Country Theater movement. Here is a work that has been praised and imitated by educational experts and by students of the drama from one end of the United States to the other. Professor Arvold is engaged whenever he can spare the time, to go about the country giving lectures on the work. Studying the work of Professor Ar- vold there can be hardly any escape from the conclusion that the reason why the powers which have ruled North Dakota want to get him out of the state is that he ig teaching people to think independently. He is en- couraging bold expression of ideas. He takes plays written by amateurs, plays (Continued on page 19) ADVERTISEMENTS -~ i3 ‘Save You Money & Before you buy & cream separator (gaso- line engine, manuro spreadeyx or farm trac- Ator) be surc and get my prices—the low- estsrlcea ever made on goods of equal quality. Wo sell direct to you from our great factories at wholesale. We specialize in manufacturing these lines each article having special patente features found on no other make. They are exclusive on the Gal - .loway,but cost younoth- ing extra. Cash or tinte. *“1 like it better than ene I paid $100 for. . 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