Over the long course of America's agricultural history, it has been true that any man or woman who presents an exceptional idea at the opportune time can influence the course of history. During the mid-1800s, a group of Illinois farmers from Putnam, Peoria, Marshall, LaSalle, and Livingston counties met at the Buel Institute, named in honor of Jesse Buel, a renowned and highly esteemed agricultural reformer from New York. The group discussed wide-ranging farm topics, including agriculture and the relationship between farming and politics. The Buel Institute has, however, come to be especially remembered for a single decision made at one of their meetings that drove the course of education since: the establishment of federally funded land-grant colleges focused on vocational and agrarian education. Few involved with this decision could have fathomed, much less anticipated, that the repercussions of their choice to support the land-grant school system would become so significant.

In 1851, approximately five years after the establishment of the Buel Institute, its members held a special meeting. Open to the public, it was held at a small Putnam County church in the town of Granville. Institute participants invited a unique guest speaker who had once been a professor at Jacksonville's Illinois College. This speaker, whose name still commands respect in the annals of educational history, was Jonathan Baldwin Turner. Throughout his life, Turner was known as an emphatic supporter of reforms aimed at improving the lifestyle and status of America's working class. His primary brainchild, the land-grant school system, was the topic of his address to the Buel Institute meeting, now noted in history as the Granville Convention of 1851.

Turner's vision of the land-grant college was an institution of learning for agrarian studies and other vocational subject matter. It was his dream to see farmers obtain a higher level of respect from the public as the foundation of the American economy and the food supply. Turner also reasoned that a better educated working class would strengthen our nation's economy as well as its social structure. In a speech he made in 1853 to the Springfield branch of the Illinois Industrial League, Turner summarized his ideals as follows:

Colleges of this day provide a good liberal education for the professional class, which constitutes only a small fraction of the population. Nowhere are there colleges for the great mass of people. Society (has not realized) that its workers, too, need an education. We need a system of education adapted to the needs of the common man, which would elevate him to his rightful place in society. Education should be practical as well as academic, and it should not be the monopoly of the privileged few, but rather the right of everyone who has the desire and the ability to learn.

The Buel Institute immediately latched on to Turner and his philosophy of education, thus placing itself in the vanguard of educational reform. Initial steps toward the establishment of the first land-grant college were taken shortly after the Granville Convention. The members of the Buel Institute began writing letters to the members of the Illinois General Assembly and to senators and representatives of every state. One thousand pamphlets describing the plan for land-grant colleges were circulated to prominent citizens, educators, key government officials, and, most importantly, to newspapers across the nation.

As a direct result of the efforts of the Buel Institute, the movement toward federally supported universities quickly rose to a position of national attention. The so called "Illinois Plan" or "Granville Plan" received excellent publicity in America's finest and most widely read periodicals. The following excerpt is taken from an article in the New York Tribune of September of 1852:

[America] needs. . . a more practical system of thorough education whereby youth, without distinction of sex, should be trained for eminent usefulness in all the

This marker was placed outside the elementary school in Granville in 1923 to commemorate the role the Buel Institute played in the establishment of the land-grant college system. (Photo courtesy David E. Shore)

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departments of industry. Illinois has taken the first noble step forward (toward this end) for which its citizens will be heartily thanked by thousands throughout the Union.

Various clubs and groups of people in every state and territory met to discuss the common goal of establishing the land-grant college system. Turner and his supporters in Congress introduced a bill based on the Granville Plan several times between 1857 and 1861, but it was defeated time and time again. In 1859 the bill finally passed both houses, but was vetoed by President Buchanan. The concept of land-grant colleges was not brought before Congress again until 1862, during the Lincoln administration. Turner worked closely with Justin Morill, a representative from Vermont, to push the bill through Congress. After five years of bureaucratic struggles, the bill became a law. The government divided twelve million acres of its own land among the states and territories. Each state or territory was to sell most of its land grant, invest the proceeds, and use the income to establish an industrial university.

More than a decade after the Granville Convention conceived the groundbreaking plan that bears its name, Jonathan Baldwin Turner and the members of Putnam County's Buel Institute were able to see the fruits of their labors and know that their efforts would improve the life of the American worker. The institute was a pacesetter in the movement toward empowering the working class. Its members had worked diligently and with dedication in order to establish a land-grant college so that their children and all who would follow could reap the benefits of higher education.

The efforts of Putnam County's Buel Institute and the vision it supported changed the face of the United States. Today, American youths have access to more than one hundred land-grant educational establishments located throughout the nation. The citizens of Putnam County should look proudly upon each, for America's land-grant institutions are the enduring legacy of the Buel Institute.— [From John Campbell, Reclaiming a Lost Heritage; Julia Edgerley, "What was the Buel Institute?" The Putnam County Record, Mar. 13, 1996; Spencer Ellsworth, Records of the Olden Time; "Historical Marker to be Unveiled," The Putnam County Record, Aug 1923; Dean Inman, "Professor Jonathan Baldwin Turner and the Granville Convention," Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, 1924; Warren, H. Vallete, History of Putnam County From Its Earliest Settlement to the Year 1876.]

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