Educator, promoter, avid art collector and long-time ringmaster at the International Live Stock Exposition, Wentworth was a man of many talents.
1887-1959 | Artist: Othmar J. Hoffler (1893-1954)
Impact & Accomplishments
Although he was born in Dover, New Hampshire, Edward Wentworth spent years of his youth in Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Iowa State College in 1903, and his master’s in 1909. From 1907 to 1913, Wentworth taught animal husbandry at the school, leaving to accept the position of associate editor of The Breeders’ Gazette.
In 1914, he was named professor at Kansas State Agricultural College, but his teaching career was interrupted by service in World War I, where he was a colonel in the field artillery. After the war, he participated in the formation of the American Expeditionary Forces School in France.
In 1919, Wentworth joined the public relations department of Armour and Company in Chicago, and soon after, began a long tenure as ringmaster of the International Live Stock Exposition.
From 1923 to 1957, Wentworth was director of Armour’s Livestock Bureau. An avid art collector, he wrote numerous books, including the 1920 biographical catalogue that documented the first two decades of this collection, The Portrait Gallery of the Saddle and Sirloin Club. Iowa State awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1951.
Did You Know?
Wentworth was decorated by the French Minister of Agriculture with Officier de Merite Agricole (1919).
One of the most interesting and philosophical experiences I have had came from Mr. R. F. Ogilvie, who was the secretary of the Clydesdale Horse Association and one of the founders of the International Live Stock Exposition. About two months after I had gone out to Kansas as professor of animal breeding, I was offered the job as editor of a new magazine, The Agricultural Digest. I wrote Mr. Ogilvie for advice, pointing out that I had just gone to Kansas but the magazine job was offering more than twice the salary. I made quite a talk on a page and a half of typewritten letter. He took a pencil and wrote on the bottom, "I never saw a sow that ran from trough to trough looking for the biggest ear that ever got fat." That helped me to be conservative the rest of my life. - Edward N. Wentworth
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