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N.E. Hansen

Agriculture Brookings, SD

N. E. Hansen was born January 4, 1866 in Ribe Parish, Denmark. A year and a half later, death visited the Hansen home claiming the life of Niels’s mother, Bodil Marie Midtgård, leaving his father Andreas without a wife and young Niels and his two older sisters without a mother. Two years later his father remarried and when Niels was seven they came to America. His stepmother, Kristine Petersen Hansen, instilled in him a love of education, both religious and secular. The family eventually made their home at Des Moines, IA. Hansen attended and graduated high school there. At the age of 16 his stepmother also passed away. Hansen was fluent in Danish, English, and German. He was a proficient writer all his life. He spent a portion of each day writing in his journal, keeping notes, and writing poetry. However, he chose to go to the Iowa State Agricultural College at Ames where he studied horticulture. His father wrote him saying, “You have chosen a wonderful road for your life, God’s great creation.” Hansen’s road to a higher education was beset with obstacles and at times he dropped out of both high school and college to seek employment to earn the funds necessary to obtain an education, including teaching at the Danish Folk School in Elk Horn, IA. Upon college graduation, Hansen worked for a nursery businesses in Iowa. He wrote advertising and pamphlets on fruit-raising in Scandinavian and in German for the new immigrants settling the Great Plains. Hansen had a lifelong goal of helping the common man. Hansen returned to Iowa Agriculture College and earned his Master’s Degree while working as assistant horticulturist. Here Hansen made connections that would profoundly change his life. One was his greenhouse assistant and student, George Washington Carver. Another was James “Tama” Wilson, who was head of the Experiment Station. Wilson would eventually become U S Secretary of Agriculture under President McKinley. He also met a young student with whom he fell in love and married, Miss Emma Pammel. Hansen became Professor of Horticulture and Forestry at Dakota Agricultural College (SDSU) in 1895, and led the government experiment station there. When James Wilson became Secretary of Agriculture, he appointed Hansen to be “USDA Plant Explorer Number 1.” Hansen made eight trips overseas in his lifetime and to Asia. He traveled across Eastern Europe, through Ukraine, Russia, Siberia, and on into Asia looking for plants that were cold, heat, and drought tolerant. Hansen was reported to have said “If it can grow in

Siberia, it might survive in South Dakota.” Professor Hansen often referred to the Great Plains as “My American Siberia.” Hansen’s trips involved months of travel over thousands of miles. His adventures were akin to an Indiana Jones Adventure as he traveled with a pistol and a rubber billyclub in his belt, a dagger, field glasses, and a magnifying lens. He traveled by sled across frozen Siberia in winter, traversed blistering wastelands, faced robbers, floods, revolutions, and plagues. He sent great volumes of plant material back

Plant Explorer: Architect of SD Agriculture

to USDA, including seeds for alfalfa and brome grass by the tons. Secretary Wilson was reported to have said: “I have 12,000 men under me, but none who knows how to work like Hansen. There is only one Hansen.” Hansen was a virtual bundle of energy. In addition to his travels, he continued as Horticulture Professor at SDSU, managed the experiment station, was secretary for the South Dakota Horticultural Society, and organized the displays in the Horticulture Building at the State Fair. He was a regular contributor to the SD Poetry Society’s publication, Pasque Petals. Yet his life was beset with heartaches and setbacks. He lost his young wife nine days before Christmas, 1904. They had been married six years, leaving him with two small children. In 1907, he married Miss Dora Pammel, his first wife’s older sister. They were married thirty-eight years. Eventually USDA cut off Hansen’s funds and explorations. When this happened, the people of South Dakota recognized Hansen’s great contributions to Northern Plains agriculture. The State Legislature appropriated funds to send Professor Hansen on two more trips. Hansen brought his introductions to Brookings where he grew and crossbred them to produce plants that could be used on the Great Plains. Many of these plants were made available through Gurney’s Seed & Nursery in Yankton. His introductions include: Cossack and falcata alfalfa, smooth brome grass, crested wheat grass, proso millet, and various varieties of soybeans and durum wheat. Many are still raised today. Others have been used in plant breeding programs to help produce the varieties we plant today. Professor Hansen has been called, “The Burbank of the Plains” for his work in plant breeding and research. During his career, Hansen collected and introduced over 400 plant varieties including forage crops, fruits, vegetables, ornamental trees, shrubs, perennials, and hardy roses. He introduced red-fleshed apples and thornless roses, which are used in plant breeding today. He developed many hardy plums, bush cherries, and crab apples, which we still grow today. Many field crops and forages descend from the varities he introduced to us. Our beehives swell with honey from yellow sweet clover, which he brought to us. In our yards, gardens, and orchards we plant his flowers, fruits, and ornamentals. From the prairie provinces of Canada to the plains of Texas, our pastures and hay meadows flourish with grasses, clover, and alfalfas he introduced. Our shelterbelts contain Dolgo crabapples, Siberian elms and crabapples, Mongolian apricots, Harbin pears, caragana, Nanking cherries, Hansen sandcherries, and Hansen hedge roses. His goal was to improve life for those on the Great Plains. We might well say that in some way, all of America has been touched by his life’s work. Professor Hansen passed away October 5, 1950. His tombstone in the Brookings Cemetery sums up his life and is a challenge to all of us: “To leave the world a better place than I found it.”

Nominator: Dan Flyger