Page 151

AGRICULTURE.
                               ACADEMIES AND SEMINARIES.
     The following institutions of academic grade, are now in operation:
Albion Academy;
Benton Academy; Big Foot Academy; Elroy Seminary; Fox Lake Seminary; two
German and
English academies in Milwaukee; Janesville Academy; Kemper Hall, Kenosha;
Lake Geneva
Seminary, Geneva; Lakeside Seminary, Oconomowoc; Marshall Academy, Marshall;
Merrill
Institute, Fond du Lac; Milwaukee Academy; Racine Academy; River Falls Institute;
Rochester Seminary; St. Catherine's Academy, Racine; St. Clara Academy; Sinsinawa
Mound; St. Mary's Institute, Milwaukee; Sharon Academy; and Wayland Institute,
Beaver
Dam.    Similar institutions formerly in operation but suspended or merged
in other institu-
tions, were: Allen's Grove Academy; Appleton Collegiate Institute; Baraboo
Collegiate Insti-
tute; Beloit Female Seminary; Beloit Seminary; Brunson Institute, Mount Hope;
Evansville Sem-
inary; Janesville Academy (merged in the high school); Kilbourn Institute;
Lancaster Institute;
Milton Academy; Platteville Academy; Southport Academy (Kenosha); Waterloo
Academy;,
Waukesha Seminary; Wesleyan Seminary, Eau Claire; and Patch Grove Academy.
       The
most important of these were the Milton and Platteville Academies, the former
merged in Mil-
ton College, the latter in the Platteville Normal School. Of the others,
several were superseded
by the establishment of public high schools in the same localities.
                                  COMMERCIAL SCHOOLS.
    Schools of this character, aiming to furnish what is called a business
education, exist in Mil-
waukee, Janesville, Madison, LaCrosse, Green Bay, Oshkosh and Fond du Lac.
The oldest and
largest is in Milwaukee, under the care of Prof. R. C. Spencer, and enrolls
from two to three
hundred students annually.
                            AGRICULTURE.
By W. W. DANIELLS, M.S., PROF. OF CHEMISTRY AND AGRICULTURE AT THE UNIVERSITY
                                      OF WISCONSIN.
    The trend of the earliest industries of a country, is the result of the
circumstances under
which those industries are developed. The attention of pioneers is confined
to supplying the
immediate wants of food, shelter, and clothing. Hence, the firs tsettlers
of a country are farm-
ers, miners, trappers, or fishermen, according as they can most readily secure
the means of pres-
ent sustenance for themselves and their families. In the early history of
Wisconsin this law is
well exemplified. The southern part of the state, consisting of alternations
of prairie and tim-
ber, was first settled by farmers. As the country has developed, wealth accumulated,
and means
of transportation have been furnished, farming has ceased to be the sole
interest. Manufactories
have been built along the rivers, and the mining industry of the southwestern
part of the state has
grown to one of considerable importance. The shore of Lake Michigan was first
mainly settled
tled by fishermen, but the rater growth of agriculture and manufactures has
nearly overshadowed
the fishing interest ; as has th-e production of lumber, in the north half
of the state, eclipsed the
trapping and fur interests of the first settlers. That the most important
industry of Wisconsin
is farming, may be seen from the following statistics of the occupation of
the people as given by
the United States census. Out of each one hundred inhabitants, of all occupations,
68 were
151