Sir Albert Howard
Summary:
Sir Albert Howard CIE (8 December 1873 – 20 October 1947) was an English botanist, and the first westerner to document and publish the Vedic Indian techniques of sustainable agriculture, now better known as organic farming. After spending considerable time learning from Indian peasants and the pests present in their soil, he called these two his professors. He was a principal figure in the early organic movement. He is considered by many in the English-speaking world to have been, along with Rudolf Steiner and Eve Balfour, one of the key evangelists of ancient Indian techniques of organic agriculture.
Life:
Albert Howard was born at Bishop’s Castle, Shropshire. He was the son of Richard Howard, a farmer, and Ann Howard, née Kilvert. He was educated at Wrekin College, Royal College of Science, South Kensington, and as Foundation Scholar, at St. John’s College, Cambridge. In 1896, he graduated in Natural Sciences at Cambridge, where he also obtained a Diploma of Agriculture in 1897. In 1899, he lectured in Agricultural Science at Harrison College, Barbados, and in 1899 and 1902, was a Mycologist and Agricultural Lecturer at the Imperial Department of Agriculture for the West Indies. From 1903–1905, he was Botanist to the South-Eastern Agricultural College, Wye; and from 1905–1924, he was Imperial Economic Botanist to the Government of India. In 1914, he was created a Companion of the Indian Empire (C.I.E.), and received a Silver Medal of the Royal Society of Arts in 1920. From 1924–1931, Howard was Director of the Institute of Plant Industry, Indore, and Agricultural Adviser to States in Central India and Rajputana. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society in 1928, and in 1930 received the Barclay Memorial Medal of that society. He was knighted in 1934, and made an Honourable Fellow of the Imperial College of Science in 1935
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Article: Keith Addison, Journey to Forever
Source: http://journeytoforever.org/farm_library/howard.html
Sir Albert Howard was the founder of the organic farming movement. He worked for 25 years as an agricultural investigator in India, first as Agricultural Adviser to States in Central India and Rajputana, then as Director of the Institute of Plant Industry at Indore, where he developed the famed Indore composting process, which put the ancient art of composting on a firm scientific basis.
Howard was a brilliant development worker. Early in his career he abandoned the restrictions of conventional agricultural science with its increasing overspecialization — “learning more and more about less and less” — and set out to learn how to grow a healthy crop in typical conditions in the field, rather than the usual untypical conditions in laboratories and test-plots that represented nothing other than themselves.
He adopted the best teachers: Nature — “the supreme farmer”, India’s peasants (whom he regarded as his prime “customers”), and the pests and weeds the scientists were committed to fighting with an ever-widening array of poisons, but which Howard called his “Professors of Agriculture”. He saw pests in the context of Nature’s use for them as censors of soil fertility levels and unsuitable crops growing in unsuitable conditions. He found that when the unsuitable conditions were corrected the pests departed. His crops were virtually immune to pest attack, and so was his livestock.
Works:
Introduction to “An Agricultural Testament” — full text online at Journey to Forever.
The Manufacture of Humus from the Wastes of the Town and the Village — “An Agricultural Testament”, by Sir Albert Howard, 1940, Oxford University Press, Appendix C, full text online at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library..
An Agricultural Testament by Sir Albert Howard, Oxford University Press, 1940.
This is the book that started the organic farming and gardening revolution, the result of Howard’s 25 years of research at Indore in India. The essence of organics is brilliantly encapsulated in the Introduction, which begins: “The maintenance of the fertility of the soil is the first condition of any permanent system of agriculture.” Read on! Full explanation of the Indore composting process and its application. Excellent on the relationship between soil, food and health. Full text online at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library.
The Waste Products of Agriculture — Their Utilization as Humus by Albert Howard and Yeshwant D. Wad, Oxford University Press, London, 1931
Where Howard’s An Agricultural Testament charts a new path for sustainable agriculture, this previous book describes how the Indore composting system which was the foundation of the new movement was developed, and why. Howard’s most important scientific publication. Full text online at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library.
Farming and Gardening for Health or Disease (The Soil and Health) by Sir Albert Howard, Faber and Faber, London, 1945, Devin-Adair 1947, Schocken 1972
This is Howard’s follow-up to An Agricultural Testament, extending its themes and serving as a guide to the new organic farming movement as it unfolded — and encountered opposition from the chemical farming lobby and the type of agricultural scientists Howard referred to as “laboratory hermits”. Together, the two books provide a clear understanding of what health is and how it works. Full text online at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library.
Sir Albert Howard in India by Louise E. Howard, Faber & Faber, London, 1953, Rodale 1954
Albert and Gabrielle Howard worked as fellow plant scientists and fellow Imperial Economic Botanists to the Government of India for 25 years, and this is a study of their work by Sir Albert’s second wife Louise (sister of Gabrielle, who died in 1930). It’s a classic study of effective Third World development work. Initially involved with improving crop varieties, the pair soon concluded it was futile to fiddle with seeds unless the work took full account of the system and circumstances as a whole. Thus developed a sustained interest in putting agricultural research into its right relation with the needs of the people, and a fundamental belief in peasant wisdom. Results were useful only if they could be translated into peasant practice. This led to the development of the famous Indore system of composting organic wastes: improved seeds were no use in impoverished soils. It’s a great story. Full text online at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library.
The Earth’s Green Carpet by Louise E. Howard, 1947, Faber & Faber, London
In this unusually clear book, Lady Howard (Sir Albert Howard’s wife), has written a “layman’s introduction” which is also a work of literary distinction. Her subject is nothing less than the life cycle studied as a whole, and this leads inevitably to the importance of a reformed agriculture for the health of the community. She saw the need for a popular introduction to her husband’s revolutionary ideas and principles, and her book draws a vivid picture of what lies behind the appearance of the Earth’s green carpet. “Nature is not concerned to give us simple lessons,” Lady Howard says — and yet she transmits them here with admirable simplicity and clarity, a delight to read. More than an introduction, the book is a survey of the whole body of work of the pioneers of organic farming and growing. Full text online at at the Journey to Forever Small Farms Library.
Sir Albert Howard Memorial Issue, Organic Gardening Magazine (Vol. 13, No. 8), September, 1948. Howard died in England in October 1947 at the age of 74. Most of this issue of J.I. Rodale’s Organic Gardening Magazine was devoted to his memorial. Five of the 15 papers in the issue are here presented in full (with thanks to Steve Solomon of the Soil and Health Library), including papers by Louise Howard, Ehrenfried Pfeiffer and Yeshwant D. Wad.
Howard on Earthworms — Howard’s Introduction to “The Formation of Vegetable Mould through the Action of Worms with Observations on their Habits” by Charles Darwin, Faber and Faber edition, London, 1945 — 4,500-word article on worms and why they matter, also covers George Sheffield Oliver’s work with earthworms in agriculture.
Howard on wholism — Howard’s Introduction to J.I. Rodale’s “Pay Dirt — Farming & Gardening with Composts” (Devin-Adair, 1946): “Everywhere knowledge increases at the expense of understanding. The remedy is to look at the whole field covered by crop production, animal husbandry, food, nutrition, and health as one related subject and then to realize the great principle that the birthright of every crop, every animal, and every human being is health.”
Nutrition & Soil Fertility — Howard’s speech in support of the Cheshire doctors’ “Medical Testament” when it was presented in 1939. From Supplement to “The New English Weekly,” April 6th, 1939. Full text online.
Soil Fertility and Health by Sir Albert Howard — From “Feeding the Family in War-time, Based on the New Knowledge of Nutrition” by Doris Grant, Harrap, London, 1942. A short and elegant exposition of the core concern of the Cheshire doctors’ “Medical Testament“.
Correspondence in the British Medical Journal — Publication of the “Medical Testament” in the British Medical Journal drew some heated debate among readers in subsequent issues. This is a letter from Howard.
Soil Fertility: the Farm’s Capital — comments by Howard in discussion on a paper presented to the Farmers’ Club by Sir Bernard Greenwell, “Journal of Farmers’ Club,” February, 1939, p. 9.
Quality of plant and animal products — Sir Albert Howard: “Manufacture of Humus from the Wastes of the Town and Village”: Lect. London Sch. Hygiene and Trop. Med. 17 June, 1937. Extract.
Humus and Disease Resistance — Sir Albert Howard: “Insects and Fungi in Agriculture.” Vol XV. No. 3. “Empire Cotton Growing Review.” July, 1938. Extract — 1,600 words.
Soil maintenance in the forest — Sir Albert Howard: “A Note on the Problem of Soil Erosion.” J. of Royal Society of Arts No. 4471, 29 July, 1938. p. 926. Extract.
How to Avoid a Famine of Quality — Sir Albert Howard, Editor of Soil and Health, from Organic Gardening, Vol. II, No. 5, November, 1947: “Western civilisation is suffering from a subtle form of famine — a famine of quality.”
The Animal As Our Farming Partner — Sir Albert Howard, from Organic Gardening, Vol. II, No. 3, September, 1947: “In Nature animals and plants lead an interlocked existence. The connection could not be closer, more permanent, or more crucial. We can observe this partnership in operation in the forest, in the prairie, in marshes, streams, rivers, lakes, and the ocean.” But not on too many of our farms.
Articles by Sir Albert Howard from Organic Gardening Magazine, 1945-47: Nutrition and Health, Health Building for the Future, Farming and Gardening for Health or Disease, The Real Basis of Public Health, The Purpose of Disease, Life and Health Restored to a Dead Farm, Dried Activated and Digested Sewage Sludge for the Compost Heap, The Leguminous Crop.
Dr. William A. Albrecht
Summary:
William A. Albrecht (1888-1974) was the foremost authority on the relation of soil fertility to human health and earned four degrees from the University of Illinois. He went on to be emeritus Professor of Soils at the University of Missouri. Dr. Albrecht saw a direct link between soil quality and food quality – a link which necessarily lent itself to human health. His work made clear that health stems from the soil. He drew direct connections between poor quality forage crops, and ill health in livestock. He developed base-level requirements for soil nutrients which are still being used.
Throughout his life, Dr. Albrecht looked to nature to guide his research and learn what optimizes soil, plant, animal, and even human health. Fairly early on in his research, Albrecht attributed many common disease conditions found in livestock directly to those animals being fed poor quality feeds. In Albrecht’s mind, that meant forage grown on soils that were deficient in essential elements. Put yet another way, Albrecht insightfully observed that “Food is fabricated soil fertility.”
Source: https://archive.ifoam.bio/en/dr-william-albrecht
Life:
William Albrecht was born of German ancestry on a farm on the prairie of north central Illinois in the Mid-West United States. After attending the local school he progressed via preparatory school to the University of Illinois where he obtained a B.A. degree in liberal arts. This led to a position teaching Latin and other subjects at Bluffton University, Ohio.[1]
Albrecht later returned to Illinois to gain a B.S. degree in biology and agricultural science. He then started graduate research in Botany whilst also teaching in the department of botany. This period was key to his lifelong devotion to scientific study of plant physiology and agriculture. It enabled him to take a microbiological view of plant structure whilst addressing the soil as a variable environment (either favourable or unsuitable). He presented his doctoral research in 1919, and it was published in the journal Soil Science in 1920 titled ‘Symbiotic nitrogen fixation as influenced by nitrogen in the soil’ His paper concluded that the nitrogen level in soil had no significant effect on fixation by legumes.
Albrecht was a devout agronomist, the foremost authority on the relation of soil fertility to human health and earned four degrees from the University of Illinois. He became emeritus professor of soils at the University of Missouri. Dr. Albrecht saw a direct link between soil quality and food quality, drawing direct connection between poor quality forage crops, and ill health in livestock.
From the late 1930s, as chairman of the Department of Soils at the University of Missouri, he began work at the Missouri Agricultural Experiment Station investigating cation ratios and the growth of legumes. He had been investigating cattle nutrition, having observed that certain pastures seemed conducive to good health, and at some point he came to the conclusion that the ideal balance of cations in the soil was “H, 10%; Ca, 60 to 75% optimal 69%; Mg, 10 to 20% optimal 12%; K, 2 to 5%; Na, 0.5 to 5.0%; and other cations, 5%”
Works:
Acres U.S.A. is North America’s oldest publisher on production-scale organic and sustainable farming. For more than four decades our mission has been to help farmers, ranchers and market gardeners grow food organically, sustainably, without harmful, toxic chemistry.
Legacy:
