August 27, 2008
AMES, Iowa — Fifty years of research and service to Iowans will be marked Sept. 16 at the 50th anniversary celebration of Iowa State University's Allee Research and Demonstration Farm near Newell.
The celebration also will honor George Allee who donated the farm to Iowa State in 1958. Tours of the mansion his parents built on the farm, which is listed on the National Registry of Historic Places, will be offered at the field day celebration.
Allee was a Harvard University graduate who developed and sold some of the first hybrid seed corn. He helped create the Newell Corn Show, an annual corn competition that attracted entries of 8,000 ears of corn at its peak in 1939.
Over the years the 160-acre research farm continued Allee's corn breeding work as well as researching beef feedlot management, corn rootworm control, tillage methods and a project that compared integrated management crop rotations.
Celebration field day registration begins at 9 a.m. with a farm tour at 9:30 featuring stops with presentations on:
"¢ Corn breeding and genetics by Kendall Lamkey, chair, Department of Agronomy
"¢ Livestock production in the bioeconomy era by John Lawrence, director, Iowa Beef Industry Center
"¢ Current projects at the farm by Lyle Rossiter, farm superintendent; an update on the farm's beef breeding project by J.R. Tait, animal scientist; and a briefing about a new on-farm research program in northwest Iowa by Josh Sievers, agricultural specialist
An anniversary program begins at 11:30 a.m. with remarks by Dean Wendy Wintersteen, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
After a lunch provided by the Buena Vista County Beef Producers, ISU Extension staff will provide information at exhibits on various topics including: the farm's corn pollination study, horticulture, beef, swine and crop research and farm management. The Practical Farmers of Iowa, Niman Ranch Pork and the Iowa corn and soybean boards also will have displays.
Tours of the Allee mansion, a corn maze and antique tractors display will begin at 12:45 p.m.