Describes a USDA bulletin in which the scientist(s) didn't write it, but rather a writer who "obtained material from many specialists, and worked it into a synthesis for a particular purpose."
"Good technical editors can go far these days towards actually protecting the job of the scientist and defending the cause of worthwhile scientific research. Let them rise to the occasion."
Feels that experiment station literature is losing ground in the scientific world. "..scientists generally are not looking to the experiment station bulletin for important contributions to science." Suggests that the station editor can help maintain high scientific standards, as well as high editorial standards. "Briefly, then, believing that the chief function of an experiment station is to experiment and that the chief purpose of its publications is to describe the experiments and announce the results rather than to persuade people to adopt new and supposedly better practices, we are striving to raise the standards of our technical publications addressed to the scientist, whether he is primarily interested in agricultural research or not, and to make the publications addressed to our farmers technically sound and practically worth while."
Examines the status of the research bulletin and the place of the technical journal article. "There seems to be a growing tendency for research workers to publish, in their respective technical journals, what amount to progress reports of their work."
Brief summary of a talk by J.T. Jardine, Chief, Office of Experiment Stations, U.S. Department of Agriculture, at 1931 AAACE convention, Corvallis, Oregon. American Association of Agricultural College Editors.
