Prof. Millikan Stalker (1841-1909)

STALKER

Posted By: Dorian Myhre (email)
Date: 11/28/2016 at 16:57:04

From Nevada Representative June 18, 1909 (front page)

OBITUARY

DEATH OF PROF. STALKER

Prof. Stalker, one of the early graduates of the State College, and for many years one of the best known members of its faculty, died at his home south of the college Tuesday. Prof. Stalker was a man of fine ability, and be was very widely known in the state, both from his relation to the college and from his service as state veterinarian. He also had political aspirations which were never realized but which assisted in the widening of his acquaintance. In recent years he had lived for the most part in retirement in the spacious home which was built by former-President Welch and which he purchased a number of years ago. The following obituary notice was written by an Ames friend of the deceased professor to the Des Moines Tribune:

Dr. Millakan Stalker passed away at his residence near the college at Ames at 6:30 p. m. on Tuesday, the fourteenth of June. He was one of the most remarkable men ever connected with the Iowa State college; he was a brilliant student, a superb lecturer, and a charming conversationalist. These qualities in brief, are some of the more important traits of this pioneer of veterinary education in the United States.

Dr. Stalker came of Quaker ancestors who lived in North Carolina His father and mother at an early stage in the their married life left the Carolinas and same to Plainsfield Ind. where Millikan was born on the sixth of August 1841. Not long afterward the Stalker family moved to Richland, Ia., where Dr. Stalker passed his youth and young manhood. There were no idle moments in this frontier life on an Iowa farm. He was diligent and faithful; he attended district schools and academies in Oskaloosa and Springdale in this state and was also teacher in the district school. At the age of twenty-eight, he came to the Iowa Agricultural college and was graduated in 1872 in the second class from the general course which corresponded with the present science course. His tastes were literary and he had intended to study law, but his plans were changed because of a vacancy occurring in the college faculty through the resignation of Prof. I. P. Roberts of the chair of agriculture, who accepted a similar position in Cornell university. Because of his maturity and experience on the farm, Dr. Stalker was offered the place thus vacated which he filled very creditably, giving all the instruction and acting as farm superintendent as well. From November 1873 until November, 1884, he also acted as secretary of the board of trustees.

In 1876 Dr. Welch recommended that instruction in veterinary science be added to the curriculum. There were few teachers of adequate experience in that subject anywhere in this country. There were several brilliant exceptions to this rule among whom may be mentioned Dr. Law of Cornell university, a Scotchman who came there through the influence of President White, and Dr. Liautard of France, who later became connected with the New York College of Veterinary Surgeons, while the teaching force of the veterinary school in Toronto was made up almost entirely of men from abroad. Dr. Stalker attended the schools in New York and Toronto, receiving his degree from the latter. He was made professor of agriculture and veterinary science at Iowa Agricultural college in 1876, his work to begin in 1877. Thus there was organized the first school of veterinary science in the west, when, in 1878, this department was separated from that of agriculture. A two years' course covering the entire school year was insisted upon from the first, and later, at the suggestion of Dr. Stalker, the course was lengthened to three years. There were few students at first, but the attendance increased steadily.

In the early days of the institution the veterinary classes were small and the work was divided between Dr. Stalker and Dr. Fairchild, and the sciences were taught by various men in the different departments of the college. The real veterinary work of the college, including the clinics, fell to the lot of Dr. Stalker.

Dr. Stalker left little in the way of published papers, except as they appeared in the reports of the state veterinary surgeon The reports that he made are commendable for the terse English and the breadth of vision. A number of substantial contributions to science were made in these reports as well.

Iowa was one of the first states in the union to take advanced ground on the suppression of contagious diseases in domestic animals. It was largely through his efforts that the law creating the office of state veterinary surgeon was passed in 1884.