Obit for: Sam Durham (d650) - Payne County OK Posted to Payne Co. OK Archives 10/04/2002 Submitted by: Jack Durham, <4jdurham@cableone.net> Return to Payne County Archives: http://www.usgwarchives.org/ok/payne/payne.html ========================================================================== USGENWEB NOTICE Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.org/copyright.htm ========================================================================== Stillwater News Press - Sunday, August 17, 1952 A. & M.'s Pasture Specialist, Sam Durham, Dies in Tulsa Sam Durham, a man who has done as much for farm people of Oklahoma as any person during the past 29 years through his statewide pasture improvement program, died Saturday morning at 8 a.m. in a Tulsa hospital at the age of 69 [born in 1883]. Funeral services will be held at the Strode Chapel, Monday at 3 p.m. Widely Known Durham has been a long-time employee of the Extension Service as pasture specialist and is widely known throughout Oklahoma. As Shawnee Brown, Extension Director, has so aptly said, "He is one of the men to whom the people of the state owe a deep debt of gratitude. As we drive over the state, we see green pastures now growing in the fields that were not so long ago covered with rag weeds, poor jo, and tickle grass. Sam was a pioneer in pasture improvement work. He had an inquiring mind and solved many of the secrets of how plants and soils behave. Through his long years of experience he developed pasture building practices that have enabled farmers and ranchers to restore thousands of acres of worn out land to productive use. A higher level of living for thousands of Oklahoma farm and ranch families can be attributed to the work of Sam Durham. Thousands of good pastures of grass, clover, and fertile land are a monument to his service." Attended A. & M. Sam was well qualified for his work as Pasture specialist. His academic training included a bachelor of science degree from Oklahoma A&M in 1904, with a major in dairying. He did graduate work at Kansas State College in Manhattan, Kansas, and received a master of science degree from the University of the Philippines, Manila, Philippine Islands. But probably more instrumental in his successes in promoting pasture work was his uncanny knack of gathering information from experiments and demonstrations of actual farmer pasture development and passing it along for others to share. Did Pasture Work Prior to his work as extension pasture specialist he worked with the Dairy department of New Mexico A&M college. State College, New Mexico. He was chief of the Animal Husbandry department of the University of the Philippines from 1909 until 1914, and did dairy and pasture work with the Banker's Association in Mississippi for about ten years, where he laid the basis for dairy improvement and pasture work that has resulted in an outstanding dairy area. He began his pasture work with the Extension Service back in 1929 when he was appointed as District Dairy Agent, devoting part of his time to pasture. His appointment as Extension pasture specialist came soon after. His first year's activities listed four major phases of pasture work: (1) establishing acre demonstrations in all sections of the state, and fertilizing these plots. (2) holding pasture demonstrations on these plots. (3) keeping and publishing exact results obtained and the amount of grazing furnished and (4) furnishing county agents with condensed information for their use in urthering pasture work in their counties. Personal Service From that beginning the pattern of his work changed but little. As the demand for his services increased he necessarily changed his technique from the individual demonstration or the personal service type and adapted techniques that would spread his work to more people. His heart was in pasture work and he lived it every day. He was equally at home in a share cropper's cabin or talking pastures with the larger land owners of the state. His services were in demand to the extent that he relinquished much of what should have been his personal time for service to others in building pastures. Came Here in 1889 Durham moved to Oklahoma in 1889 with his father, Andrew Jackson Durham. They staked out a claim two miles east of Stillwater, where they lived for a number of years. Durham rode horseback into Stillwater to attend A&M until he received his degree in 1904. He had served on several boards and committees during his career and served five years on the selective service appeals board for district One, for which he received a commendation from President Roosevelt and then governor of Oklahoma, Robert S. Kerr. Durham is survived by his wife, Pearl, of the home address in Yale; sons, Jack [Buford Jackson Durham], Wichita, Kansas; Sam, [Samuel Bert Jr.] Roswell, New Mexico; Ed, [Orlo Edwin Durham] Stillwater; one daughter, Mrs. Bob Riley [Lois Fern "Polly" Durham], Enid; Three sisters, Mrs. C. A. Wilde [Sophronia May Durham], Catoosa, and Fern [Fern Joy] Durham, Stillwater, and Mrs. Don Leister [Sarah Alpha Durham], Stockton, California; One brother, Will Durham, Stillwater, and several grandchildren. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Return to Payne County Archives: http://www.usgwarchives.org/ok/payne/payne.html