Skip to main content
An official website of the United States government.

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Lowell Dean Hill Collection

 Collection
Identifier: MS0469

  • Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The Lowell Dean Hill Collection includes his professional papers, unpublished manuscripts, notes, correspondence and publications.

The papers include various topics regarding grain quality. One group of materials consists of the history of North Central Regional Research Project which was Hill's concept of a national (instead of regional) plan of "needs" which involved university, government agencies, and industry.

Another set of materials include those documenting a four-year project in Russia (COMEX project) developing grain marketing skills in several hundred Russian potential grain buyers, an organization which parallels this country's Grain and Feed Dealers Association. This project was facilitated by former USDA agricultural attache Allan Mustard. It is only one of the AID projects in Russia to have survived and to operate independently with no continuing support.

There are clippings files written by the Pulitzer Prize winner James Risser from the 1970s "Grain Weights and Grading" scandal resulting in several indictments. It includes nearly all of the articles in the Des Moines Register of that era, plus some additional sources.

The collection includes Congressional bills related to Grain Grades, and the U.S. Grain Standards Act. Only one finally passed, but several congressmen were trying to write their own. Part of that includes the Hearings that Hill organized at the University of Illinois with photographs of the five congressmen who attended.

There is an incomplete file of all that transpired in the 1985 "Grain Quality Workshops," including many of the notes and letter correspondence about the disagreement between participants. The exchanges do not include Hill but he planted the seed several years earlier in government and industry circles. A result was a change in U.S. Grain Standards Act that includes his insert for economic justification.

The collection includes Hill's wife's (Betty E. Hill) signed journal "On a Magic Carpet of Corn: A world of Adventure published locally (40 copies exist) in 2012. The journal documents the details of Hill's research trips from 1975-2004 in the following places: Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Argentina, Japan, Hong Kong, Yugoslavia, Indonesia, Singapore, China, Thailand, Korea, Venezuela, Poland, Colombia, Egypt, Chile, Hungary, Russia, and Zimbabwe.

Dates

  • Creation: 1905-2016
  • Creation: Majority of material found within 1963-1998

Conditions Governing Access

Biographical Sketch

Lowell D. (Lowell Dean) Hill (1930-) is an expert on grain quality economics and marketing strategies. He received his bachelor's degree in agricultural education at Iowa State University in 1951, and his master's and Ph.D. degrees in agricultural economics at Michigan State University in 1961 and 1963, respectively.

In 1963, Hill became a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Illinois and served on the faculty for 35 years. In conjunction with this position, he researched grain quality and marketing strategies in more than 50 countries. Hill testified at several U.S. Congressional hearings related to grain grades, weight irregularities, and the U.S. Grain Standards Act. The results of his work helped shape U.S. grain grading laws. In 1989, Hill received the USDA Distinguished Service Award for improving quality of grain markets and opening new market opportunities.

Hill has written or edited more than 700 publications, including five books, 28 book chapters, and numerous journal articles. Requests for lectures and workshops led him to develop video presentations on grain marketing practices and principles in the United States, Europe, Japan and South America. Some of the videos were translated into six languages and distributed worldwide by the U.S. Grains Council and the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service.

Total Size of Collection

15 letter_document_box

9 half_letter_document_box

1 boxes (1 box, 18.5 x 14 x 3)

10 Linear Feet (25 boxes)

Language of Materials

English

Content Description

The Lowell Dean Hill Collection consists of unpublished papers, correspondence, publications, and documents related to Hill's research on grain quality. Included are materials related to his involvement in the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service COMEX project. There are also minutes from Grain Quality Workshops of the North American Export Grain Association, and materials related to Hill's leadership on the international study on grain quality conducted by the U.S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment. Personal and biographical materials include documents on Hill's research work, along with selected complementary published resources from his personal library. Hill collected many resources while researching and writing his 1990 book, Grain Grades and Standards: Historical Issues Shaping the Future, including many reports that address USDA-related issues concerning grain grades.

The collection spans the years 1905 to 2016, the bulk of which are from 1969 to 1997.

Accruals

This is a growing collection.

Status
Completed
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
Undetermined
Script of description
Code for undetermined script

Repository Details

Part of the National Agricultural Library Special Collections Repository

Contact:
National Agricultural Library
10301 Baltimore Avenue
Room 309
Beltsville Maryland 20705 USA
301-504-5876