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Pochva Americana II

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Soil Science Americana

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Abstract

By the early 1990s, tens of millions of people had immigrated to the USA. Some immigrants became prominent scientists who individually and collectively shaped American and global soil science, including Jacob Lipman, Jacob Joffe, Constantin Nikiforoff, Selman Waksman, Otto Zeasman, Sergei Wilde, and Vladimir Ignatieff. They came from Russia and surrounding countries in the search for education, which in Russia was the privilege of nobility, government servants, and city folks. Many Jewish families fled because of pogroms, plundering, and persecution. This chapter reviews the life and works of immigrants from Russia and northern Europe and their contributions to the establishment of the soil science discipline and International Society of Soil Science. The soil science connections between Russia and the USA have been an important for the development of the discipline but have also been affected by politics. In the 1950s when anti-Communists views flourished, various soil scientists including Charles Kellogg were questioned about their sympathy for Russian soil science.

“There is a more or less definite relation between man in his physical and mental makeup and his soil environment. Systematic studies are still lacking on the part that soils have played in the past and are now playing in determining the peculiarities of races and of individuals.”

Jacob Lipman, 1927

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  1. Department of Soil Science, FD Hole Soils Lab, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA

    Alfred E. Hartemink

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Hartemink, A.E. (2021). Pochva Americana II. In: Soil Science Americana. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-71135-1_9

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