CIVIL WAR DATE PRESIDENT LINCOLN 1st AGRICULTURE SECY NEWTON SIGNED LETTER 1863

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CIVIL WAR DATE PRESIDENT LINCOLN 1st AGRICULTURE SECY NEWTON SIGNED LETTER 1863:
$105.50

ISAAC NEWTON

(1800 - 1867)

PRESIDENT LINCOLN’SCIVIL WAR COMMISSIONER OF THE NEWLY FORMED DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE!

A member of the U.S. AgriculturalSociety, Isaac Newton campaigned actively for the establishment of a federal Departmentof Agriculture. On May 15, 1862President Abraham Lincoln signed the bill creating the U.S. Department of Agricultureand appointed Newton the first Commissioner of Agriculture. Newton authored thevery first volume (for 1862) of the Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture,a series of books published yearly by the USDA which continue through thepresent day as the Yearbook of Agriculture. His first publication was mainly acall in the midst of the Civil War for the science of agriculture to carry onand continue to modernize – also to American farmers to be among thebest-educated and well-rounded individuals as would befit their noble calling.

HERE\'S A RARE CIVIL WARDATE 1863 AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED BY NEWTON ON \"DEPARTMENT OFAGRICULTURE\" LETTERHEAD to David A Wells, Esq., Troy, New York regarding aclaim against the “…late Division of thePatent Office…the whole matter has been referred to the Attorney General of theUnited States for his decision, which is now daily looked for…” The letter is dated at Washington, D. C.,Oct. 23rd, 1863.

The ALS measures 5.5” x 9” and is in very good condition!

A RARE ADDITION TO YOUR CIVIL WAR ERAPOLITICAL/AGRICULTURAL HISTORY AUTOGRAPH, MANUSCRIPT & EPHEMERA COLLECTION!

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE HONORABLEISAAC NEWTON

Newton, Isaac (31Mar. 1800-19 June 1867), farmer and first commissioner of agriculture, was bornin Burlington County, New Jersey, the son of Isaac Newton and Mary Newton,farmers. Following his father\'s early demise, the infant Isaac and his motherlived in Burlington County with his paternal grandfather, a well-establishedfarmer. There Newton learned the agricultural trade.

After completing a common schooleducation, Newton chose to follow in the footsteps of both his father and grandfather,becoming a farmer. After his marriage in 1821 to Dorothy Burdsall, Newton ranseveral farms in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. (The number of their children,if any, is unknown.) His farms produced well, and he expanded into theproduction of ice cream and confections in Philadelphia. He also carried on asuccessful butter trade, even selling to the White House. A member of thePennsylvania State Agricultural Society and the U.S. Agricultural Society, hecampaigned actively for the establishment of a federal department ofagriculture.

In 1861 Newton obtained his firstgovernmental position in the U.S. Patent Office, where he was thesuperintendent of its agricultural division. This office, established in 1839,was responsible for the collection and distribution of seeds, the disseminationof information to farmers, the collection of agricultural statistics, and\"other agricultural purposes.\" Operating on the most minimal ofbudgets, it was the precursor to the modern Department of Agriculture.

On 15 May 1862 President AbrahamLincoln signed the bill creating the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It hadnarrowly missed becoming a bureau of agriculture within the Department of theInterior. On 1 July 1862 Lincoln appointed Newton the first commissioner ofagriculture. Newton envisioned a Department of Agriculture with duties farbeyond those carried out formerly by the Patent Office. He planned for hisdepartment to systematically collect and publish information about agriculture,to introduce new plants and animals to the United States, and to addressquestions from farmers. He also hoped that the department would testimplements, carry out chemical analyses of soils and plants, and help establishwithin the department professorships in entomology and botany. He planned forthe creation of an agricultural library and museum. In all of these objectives,Newton was successful.

Newton was particularly careful aboutestablishing statistical studies of American agriculture. Beginning in thesummer of 1863, the department published regular reports, detailing crop andweather conditions. Monthly crop reports, including acreage, yields, andproduction, began in 1863, and the department\'s yearly reports, started in1861, have continued ever since. In his 1864 annual report, Newton advocatedthat the federal government issue daily weather reports; these recommendationsled to the organization of the Weather Bureau.

Because the department was founded atthe beginning of the Civil War, Newton was also responsible for aiding in theUnion\'s war effort. The government established a garden in Washington, D.C.,where the Department of Agriculture attempted to grow cotton and findsubstitutes for products, such as cane sugar, flax, and hemp, normally grown inthe southern states. Some of these experiments were successful, others werenot. At the war\'s conclusion, Newton hoped for a speedy reunification, withoutwhich the United States was unlikely to be agriculturally self-sufficient. In1866 he sent Oliver H. Kelley, a clerk, to the southern states to see whatcould be done to assist southern farmers damaged by the war.

One of Newton\'s chief accomplishmentsas head of the Department of Agriculture was bringing high-quality personnelinto the department. Although Newton himself was not highly educated, duringhis years in office a nucleus of scholarly college- and university-trained mencame to work for him, including botanist William Saunders, who was responsibleboth for laying out many of the parks in Washington, D.C., and for theintroduction of the navel orange to the United States, and clerk Kelley, whowas a founder of the Grange. Newton set a standard that was maintained by thedepartment long after his years as commissioner.

Newton died before the Department ofAgriculture\'s new office building could be completed. The cause of his deathofficially was sunstroke, suffered in the line of duty. The previous JulyNewton had heard a storm approaching and went to one of the department\'sexperimental farms to make sure that wheat samples being harvested wereprotected from the rain. He vigorously attended to these duties while wearing ahigh silk hat and a frock coat. Overcome by heat and exertion, he neverrecovered, dying eleven months later. The location of his death is unknown.

As the first commissioner of theDepartment of Agriculture, Newton established the priorities of the agency. Heenvisioned his department as a scientific institution, gathering informationthat would make farmers more productive and keep the United Statesself-sufficient. He created a firm foundation for the department, giving it aseparate identity, including its own office building, library, and museum.Although he did not envision the Department of Agriculture as the advocacyagency for farmers that it would become, he was influential in establishingmany of its long-term functions and goals.

Bibliography

For more information see Willard W.Cochrane, The Development of American Agriculture: A Historical Analysis (1979)p. 96; J. W. Stokes, \"Death of Hon. Isaac Newton,\" Monthly Report ofthe Agricultural Department, May-June 1867; and U.S. Department of Agriculture,After a Hundred Years: The Yearbook of Agriculture, 1962 (1962), and Century ofService: The First 100 Years of the United States Department of Agriculture(1963). [Source: American National Biography]

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