EXAMPLE PAGE - SCHOOL BROCHURE - UNBOUNCE - Purdue University - Flipbook - Page 29
Forestry faculty and University administrators responsible
for obtaining the property gathered at the Davis old-growth
forest in 1921. From left: George Christi, first director of the
Purdue Extension Service and Purdue Experiment Station;
Burr Prentice, then a professor in the School of Science,
later the first department head in forestry; John Skinner
(A’1897), dean of agriculture; Winthrop Stone, Purdue
University president; and Harry Reed (A’30, HDR A’58),
who would later become dean of agriculture at Purdue.
Burr Prentice’s camp during the summers of 1926 and
1927. He spent both summers with his family tagging and
inventorying trees.
PURDUEFORLIFE .ORG
DAVIS PURDUE
AGRICULTURAL
CENTER
ENCOMPASSING 703 ACRES (126 OF WHICH ARE FOREST) IN
northwestern Randolph and southwestern Jay Counties, the Davis Purdue Agricultural Center represents a
significant milestone for the FNR Department. Martha F.
Davis bequeathed the property to the University in 1917
in memory of her son, stipulating that its wooded tract
be preserved as an example of Indiana’s native forest at
a time when the state had few forested areas.
Although forestry instruction began at Purdue in 1905
with a two-semester sequence of courses taught by
Stanley Coulter (HDR S’31), the University didn’t establish a forestry major in the School of Science until 1914.
Burr Prentice joined the faculty that year as the University’s first instructor of forestry. In 1926, Prentice began the
process of painstakingly numbering, mapping, describing, and tagging every tree in the Davis forest. It is now
recognized as the oldest mapped temperate deciduous
forest in North America, and its preserved woodland
was officially dedicated as a registered National Natural
Landmark by the National Park Service in 1975.
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