Bailey, Liberty Hyde, 1858–1954, American botanist and horticulturist, b. South Haven, Mich., grad. Michigan Agricultural College (now Michigan State Univ.), 1882. At Cornell he was professor of horticulture (1888–1903) and dean of the agricultural college and director of the agricultural experiment station (1903–13). Through numerous writings and as chairman of President Theodore Roosevelt's Commission on Country Life (1908), he worked for the improvement of rural life. Bailey was influential in establishing horticulture as a respected science. He wrote many basic works on botany and horticulture, edited The Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture (6 vol., 1914–17; new ed. 1935) and Cyclopedia of American Agriculture (4 vol., 1907–9), and compiled (with E. Z. Bailey) Hortus (1930, rev. ed. 1935) and Hortus Second (1941). Hortus Third was published in 1976.
See biographies by P. Dorf (1956) and A. D. Rodgers (1949, repr. 1965).
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