51bc studies, no. 78, Summer 3A Nation of Artists” .docx

“A Nation of Artists”:
Alice R avenhill and the Society for
the Furtherance of British Columbia
Indian Arts and Crafts
L i Ly n n Wa n *
In 1996, Bill Reid sold a bronze sculpture to the Vancouver
International Airport Authority for $3 million, making him the
highest-paid Canadian artist to that date. An image of this
sculpture, The Spirit of Haida Gwaii, adorned the Canadian
twenty-
dollar bill from 2004 until 2012, and the original casting of the
sculpture
stands in front of the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC.
Reid’s
journey to this position as a Haida artist and Canadian icon
provides
some insight into the often contradictory role of indigenous
imagery in
visual representations of Canadian culture and identity. While
Reid’s
work was certainly inspired by his ancestral ties, he learned
technique
in a jewellery-making course at the Ryerson Institute of
Technology in
Toronto, and he learned the fundamentals of Northwest Coast
design
from two books, in particular. One of these books is the

American
museum director Robert Bruce Inverarity’s Art of the Northwest
Coast
Indians, which was published in 1950; the other is Alice
Ravenhill’s
A Corner Stone of Canadian Culture: An Outline of the Arts and
Crafts of
the Indian Tribes of British Columbia.1
* Research for this article was funded by the Social Sciences
and Humanities Research Council
of Canada. Thanks to Shirley Tillotson and Richard Mackie for
invaluable guidance and
editorial advice. And to Rebecca Moy-Behre, who taught me
arts and crafts – not as an idea
but as a way of life.
1 Alice Ravenhill, A Corner Stone of Canadian Culture: An
Outline of the Arts and Crafts of the
Indian Tribes of British Columbia (Victoria: British Columbia
Provincial Museum, 1944).
In Tippett’s interpretation, Reid was consistently ambiguous
about his identity for the first
twenty years of his career. His decision to promote himself as
an “all Indian” artist did not
come about until the 1970s, after he received a Canada Council
fellowship. While Reid had
Haida ancestry and ties to the Haida village of Skidegate, and
his great-great-uncle, Charles
Edenshaw, as well as his grandfather, Charles Gladstone, were
both Haida artists, his mother
was raised to “become more white and less Haida,” and his
father was a “white man” in the
frontier of northern British Columbia in the early twentieth
century. See Maria Tippett, Bill
Reid: The Making of An Indian (Toronto: Random House,

2003), 31, 25, 67.
bc studies52
The story of Alice Ravenhill, who spearheaded an arts and
crafts
revival in British Columbia in the 1930s, is an important one to
tell, and
not only because of her influence on Reid’s career. As Ronald
Hawker
has shown, Ravenhill’s work was incorporated into the Indian
education
system in both residential and day schools throughout the
province.2
By the 1940s, the notion of indigenous peoples being what
Ravenhill
described as “a nation of artists,”3 with inherent tendencies
towards the
visual and oral arts, became institutionalized at a federal level
in various
Department of Indian Affairs (dia) policies. This led to an
increase in
the production and sale of arts and crafts on the reserves.
Indigenous
art and imagery came to reflect continuity rather than extinction
as the
widespread nineteenth-century notion of the “Vanishing Indian”
was
compromised by the reality of an increasing indigenous
population.4
Born in England in 1859 into a privileged family, Ravenhill
began her
career as an educator in the fields of public health, home
economics,

and child care. She immigrated to Vancouver Island in 1910
after a
distinguished professional career in England. Her interest in
indigenous
arts and crafts only began in the late 1920s, but by the 1930s
she had
already become something of a local authority on the subject.
During
the 1930s and into the 1940s, Ravenhill devoted much of her
time to the
revitalization of indigenous arts and crafts in British Columbia,
a moral
endeavour that gained publicity and support from both
indigenous and
non-indigenous communities. Ravenhill’s self-education in
indigenous
arts and crafts began with needlework. On hooked rugs, bags,
book
covers, cushions, and other household objects she reproduced,
for sale,
various indigenous designs garnered from the Provincial
Archives.5
2 Hawker argues that Ravenhill and the Society for the
Furtherance of British Columbia
Indian Arts and Crafts, which she founded, used arts and crafts
as a way of reforming the
Indian educational system and that their work was key to the
“transition of First Nations
art promotion from voluntary organizations (in the 1930s) to
state institutions (in the 1940s).”
Although Hawker demonstrates that Ravenhill’s work stems
from a philanthropic notion that
educational reform through arts and crafts programs in Indian
day and residential schools
would contribute to solving the “Indian Problem,” he also shows

that this type of reform
was in line with assimilative policies and served to legitimize
government control over the
production and distribution of indigenous-made objects. See
Ronald Hawker, Tales of Ghosts:
First Nations Art in British Columbia, 1922-61 (Vancouver: ubc
Press, 2002), 82-99.
3 Alice Ravenhill, “Formation in Victoria of the Society for the
Furtherance of British Columbia
Indian Arts and Crafts” (1945), 6, Society for the Furtherance
of British Columbia Indian
Arts and Crafts (hereafter bciac Papers), 1939-1954, box 1, file
3, British Columbia Archives
(hereafter bca). See also Alice Ravenhill, “Biography, 1923-
1951” (1952), 224, bciac Papers, bca.
4 See Daniel Francis, “The Bureaucrat’s Indian,” in The
Imaginary Indian: The Image of the Indian
in Canadian Culture (Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2011) ,
209-32.
5 In the latter half of the 1920s, Emily Carr was also
reproducing Northwest Coast designs,
for sale, in needlework and on pottery. See Hawker, Ghosts, 84;
Maria Tippett, Emily Carr:
A Biography (Toronto: Stoddart, 1994 [1979]), 134-36;
National Gallery of Canada/Vancouver
53Alice Ravenhill
Starting in the late 1920s, Ravenhill also gave public talks “on
the
characteristics and claims of these provincial tribal arts” at the

Island
and Victoria Arts and Crafts Society, the Women’s University
Club,
and the Business Men’s “Lunch Club” in Victoria. Ravenhill’s
nee-
dlework designs and her talks were initially met with poor sales,
poor
attendance, and a general lack of interest. This changed in 1935,
when
Ravenhill redirected her attention to children. That year,
sponsored
by the Carnegie Fund, she gave a series of four talks at the
Provincial
Museum of Natural History and Anthropology, which attracted a
total
audience of over 250 children. In the fall of 1936, an eight-
week course
on “British Columbia Indians” was added to the provincial
grade school
curriculum “without,” in her view, “authentic guidance being
provided
for the teachers.” Ravenhill took up this issue with the school
board,
and the result was the publication of her The Native Tribes of
British
Columbia in 1938.6
This influential book provides an overview of traditional
indigenous
culture in pre-contact times. The cover bears an image of a
totem pole,
leaning slightly to the right, as if to express its age and
weariness at
Art Gallery, Emily Carr: New Perspectives on a Canadian Icon
(Vancouver: Douglas and
McIntyre, 2006), plates 89-92.

6 Ravenhill, “Formation,” 2-3.
Figure 1. Alice Ravenhill, circa 1936. Image I-51527 courtesy
of Royal British Columbia
Museum, BC Archives.
bc studies54
having stood, neglected, for so long. Here, Ravenhill defines
culture as
“a combination or embodiment of inherited customs and
traditions
which control their [indigenous people’s] actions, regulate their
pro-
cedures, and find expression in their emotions and arts.”7 While
she
also discusses geography, tools, weapons, housing, and food
production
methods in Native Tribes, Ravenhill’s main focus is on
indigenous arts
and crafts.
Native Tribes gained an unexpected and significant
endorsement in
1939, when a copy of the book was presented to the Queen
consort of
England, Queen Elizabeth, by Lady Tweedsmuir, a personal
friend of
Ravenhill’s and wife of the governor general of Canada. The
Queen
expressed much interest in the book and wrote Ravenhill that
she was
“specially desirous of learning more on the subject of the North
West

Pacific Coast arts and crafts.”8 Encouraged by the success of
Native
Tribes, Ravenhill formed a committee based in Victoria in 1940
called
the Society for the Furtherance of British Columbia Indian Arts
and
Crafts. This society was created “with the hope of arousing
more
interest in our BC Indians and their arts and crafts to promote
the
exercise of inherited abilities for their own welfare and for the
cultural
and commercial advancement of Canada.”9 Members of the
society
included Major Llewellyn Bullock-Webster, director of the
province’s
school and community drama; Alma Russell, formerly of the
Provincial
Archives; Dr. G. Clifford Carl, director of the Provincial
Museum of
Natural History and Anthropology; and anthropologist A.E.
Pickford.10
The first thing the society did following its formation was to
notify
provincial and federal dia officials of its existence in an attempt
to
raise funds and to gain official government support. For several
years,
Ravenhill corresponded with Harold McGill, dia director in
Ottawa;
R.A. Hoey, who was then in charge of the section concerned
with
school curricula and industrial training; and Major D.M.
MacKay,
Indian commissioner for the province. Despite her efforts, by
the mid-

1940s Ravenhill lamented: “So far War claims have in every
case been
quoted as adequate reasons for inability to cooperate in
suggestions or
to respond to more definite requests.”11
7 Alice Ravenhill, The Native Tribes of British Columbia
(Victoria: Charles F. Banfield, 1938), 10.
8 Ravenhill, “Formation,” 10.
9 Ibid., 11.
10 For Bullock-Webster, see J.L. Hoffman, “Bullock-Webster
and the BC Dramatic School,
1921-1932,” Theatre Research in Canada [Online], 8, 2 ( June
1987). For Carl and Pickford, see
Peter Corley-Smith, White Bears and Other Curiosities: The
First 100 Years of the Royal British
Columbia Museum (Victoria: Royal British Columbia Museum,
1989).
55Alice Ravenhill
Even though Ravenhill and the society were unable to solicit
government funding, they continued lobbying the government
and
proceeded with their work of promoting young BC indigenous
artists
within the province, throughout Canada, and abroad. In 1941, a
rep-
resentative body of the Victoria society was formed in Oliver,
British
Columbia, “which,” wrote Ravenhill, “included from the start

three
Okanagan Indians.” Two years later, the first BC Aboriginal
people
became honorary members of the Victoria society, after “several
Chiefs
and representative individuals” attended meetings and assisted
the
society in its efforts to “arouse more public interest.”12
Ravenhill ’s second book, A Corner Stone of Canadian Culture:
An Outline of the Arts and Crafts of the Indian Tribes of British
Columbia,
appeared in 1944 after more than three years of labour on the
part of
Ravenhill and her assistant Betty Newton. This monograph
contains
drawings of designs created by Bill Reid’s great-great-uncle,
Charles
Edenshaw, and Reid later credited this book with contributing
to his
artistic identity and development.13 Corner Stone was
distributed to
all of the “Indian schools” in the province. Its purpose was to
revive
interest in, provide instruction for, and stimulate the production
of
“traditional” arts and crafts among indigenous children. For
Ravenhill,
Corner Stone was an expression of her belief that British
Columbia’s
indigenous peoples were “a nation of artists,” with inherent
tendencies
towards the visual and oral arts.
Work on Corner Stone commenced in 1941, when the dia office
in
Ottawa commissioned Ravenhill to produce twenty wall charts
of

various designs “to cover all phases of Indian art work and all
parts of
the Province.”14 The charts, along with over a hundred pages of
text
outlining the characteristics, significance, and legendary origins
of each
design, were circulated among the Indian schools in the
province. These
were also published in a condensed book form, for sale to the
general
public.15 Ravenhill and Newton were paid one hundred dollars
for their
work, which, as Ravenhill declared, did “not much more than
cover the
cost of materials,” but they felt that their work was “richly
worthwhile
as sowing precious seed.”16 Following the publication of
Corner Stone,
Ravenhill stepped down from the presidency of the society
because of
12 Ibid., 12-13.
13 Hawker, Ghosts, 89; Tippett, Reid, 67.
14 MacKay to Ravenhill, 17 June 1940, bciac Papers, bca. See
also Ravenhill to Bullock-Webster,
11 February 1941, box 1, file 2, bciac Papers, bca; G. Clifford
Carl to Ravenhill, 21 February
1941, bciac Papers, bca; and Ravenhill to Carl, 25 February
1941, bciac Papers, bca.
15 G. Clifford Carl, “Foreword,” in Ravenhill, Corner Stone.
16 Ravenhill to Beatrice Cave-Browne-Cave, 29 June 1940,
bciac Papers, bca.

bc studies56
“a disabling accident,” and her role in it was taken over by Dr.
Carl of
the Provincial Museum of Natural History and Anthropology.
However,
Ravenhill’s leadership and her approach to revitalizing
indigenous arts
and crafts continued to influence the movement at least into the
1950s.
Ravenhill was a central figure in the revitalization of
indigenous arts
and crafts in British Columbia, and her two books did indeed
become
“cornerstones” of the movement. A word is required here on the
larger
movement that informed the BC indigenous arts and crafts
revival. Arts
and Crafts, an international reform movement that was both
philan-
thropic and socialist, was based on an ideology that championed
the arts
and crafts as a means towards economic self-sufficiency and
moral uplift.
The movement took hold in England, the United States, and
Canada
during the late nineteenth century, largely based on the
philosophy
popularized by the British writer, artist, and socialist William
Morris.
The socio-economic aspect of this philosophy encouraged a
return to a
communal village economy, wherein artisans perfected their
craft and
bartered their wares. Aesthetically, the Arts and Crafts
philosophy

advocated imperfection as “evidence of the essential humanity
of the
work process; by contrast, the perfections of antique handwork
and
modern machine production were considered the products of
different
types of ‘slave’ labour.”17 In other words, a return to the daily
use and
production of beautiful, handmade objects was one solution to
the ills
of industrial society. This movement, in its purest form, was
embodied
in cooperative rural craft communities like the Shakers in the
north-
eastern United States. By the early twentieth century, the
influence of
the Arts and Crafts movement on many reformers and social
workers
was apparent. Administrators of settlement houses like Hull
House in
Chicago and Toynbee Hall in London adapted Morris’s ideas in
their
social work, convinced that art education was the key to the
moral uplift
of impoverished immigrants.18
In early twentieth-century Canada, Arts and Crafts movements
adapted variations of these earlier socialist ideas, which found
parallels
in “modern” antimodernist sentiments. The BC indigenous arts
and
crafts revival was a localized variation of this larger movement.
Here,
pre-industrial society had consisted of only a handful of white
settlers
17 Diane Waggoner, ed., The Beauty of Life: William Morris

and the Art of Design (New York:
Thames and Hudson, 2003), 25.
18 For settlement houses, see Mary Lynn McCree Bryan,
Barbara Bair, and Maree De Angury,
eds., The Selected Papers of Jane Addams: Preparing to Lead,
1860-1881 (Urbana: University of
Illinois Press, 2003); and Mary Lynn McCree Bryan and Allen
F. Davis, 100 Years at Hull-House
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990).
57Alice Ravenhill
and a large population of indigenous communities. Thus, for
British
Columbians, indigenous people were central actors in the
Romantic
notion of the “primitive,” on which the antimodernist image of
the
idyllic “premodern” society was based. Proponents of
revitalizing in-
digenous arts and crafts believed that “authentic” indigenous
designs,
aesthetics, colours, and techniques could only be produced by
authentic
indigenous people, by means of “inherited ability.”19 In other
words,
the essence of indigenous arts and crafts was its inherently
“primitive”
nature. Equally important to this movement was the notion that,
because
indigenous people in British Columbia had been colonized,
much of
their knowledge of traditional arts and crafts had been, or was,

in the
process of being lost.
The most immediate task during the early years of the revival
was
the methodical process of defining what constituted authentic
“Indian”
arts and crafts before that knowledge disappeared. In this way,
the
BC Indian Arts and Crafts revival overlapped, in theory and in
practice,
with professional and amateur salvage ethnologists of the day.
But there
were key differences in their objectives: the former sought to
revitalize
the arts while the latter aimed only to preserve material art
objects.
In order to revitalize, however, traditional “Indian” culture first
had to
be defined. This was Ravenhill’s agenda and it was what she
achieved
with her two books.
Her interest in indigenous arts and crafts renewal was not
unique,
nor was it carried out in isolation. For example, her
contemporaries and
peers Maisie Hurley and George Raley also engaged in
philanthropic
work that involved revitalizing indigenous art and culture in the
province. Their work differed from that of the late nineteenth-
and early
twentieth-century salvage ethnologists and collectors, who
focused their
attention primarily on the accumulation and preservation of
material
objects.20 While Hurley is best known for the Maisie Hurley
Collection

of Native Art that is now housed at the North Vancouver
Museum and
Archives, she was also an educator and advocate of indigenous
rights.
Her biographer, Sharon Fortney, explains that Hurley
envisioned her
art collection “playing an important role in cultural education
and in
the revitalization of Native artistic traditions.”21 Similarly, the
Reverend
20 For salvage ethnology, see Douglas Cole, Captured Heritage:
The Scramble for Northwest Coast
Artifacts (Vancouver: ubc Press, 1995).
21 Sharon Fortney, “Entwined Histories: The Creation of the
Maisie Hurley Collection of Native
Art,” BC Studies 167 (2010): 73. See also Janey Mary Nicol,
“The Voice of Maisie Hurley,” British
Columbia History 45, 2 (2012): 37-43.
bc studies58
George Raley, who headed the Coqualeetza Residential School
in
Chilliwack, believed that revitalizing indigenous arts and crafts
was
essential to the practical training, education, and economic
well-being of
indigenous children.22 His biographer, Paige Raibmon,
discovered that
Raley’s ideas about the role of arts and crafts in improving the

lives of
indigenous people in Canada were also inspired by the “New-
Deal-for-
Indians” era in the United States in the 1920s and 1930s.23 In
this period,
American Indian educational policy shifted from one that sought
to
eradicate indigenous culture to one that aimed to develop
indigenous
culture in the Indian schools. Even though Canadian Indian day
and
residential schools maintained an official policy of cultural
assimilation
until after the Second World War, by the late 1930s, individuals
like
Raley, Hurley, and Ravenhill were active and successful in
promoting
a program of revitalizing indigenous arts and crafts in these
schools.24
Ravenhill ’s antimodernist critique of industrial capital echoed
William Morris and, more distantly, Marx’s ideas about the
circulation
of capital.25 In Native Tribes, she notes the timeliness of
studying pre-
historic peoples and cultures in the midst of an unprecedented
economic
depression – the first great crisis of industrial capitalism in
Canada.
Ravenhill describes 1930s Canada as
a period when comfort and convenience [were] measured by
ability to
pay for their provision unrelated to the exercise of individual
resource-
fulness; when every detail of daily life [was] supplied on a large
scale

by mechanized methods; when distance [was] annihilated by
modern
devices of transport, [and when] the achievements of a people
isolated
for many centuries from contact with others [were] apt to be
over-
looked and deprecated.26
Here, her argument for the importance of understanding pre-
industrial
artistic skills is expressed as a critique of contemporary society.
This
antimodernist aspect of her work, which drew from Morris’s
writings,
ethnological practices of the day, New Deal politics in the
United States,
and Marxism, contributed to her success in generating public
interest
in indigenous arts and crafts.
22 Paige Raibmon, “A New Understanding of Things Indian:
George Raley’s Negotiation of
the Residential School Experience,” BC Studies 110 (1996): 86-
93.
23 Ibid., 90-91.
24 For indigenous arts and crafts in Canada, see Gerald R.
McMaster, “Tenuous Lines of Descent:
Indian Arts and Crafts of the Reservation Period,” Canadian
Journal of Native Studies 9,
2 (1989): 205-36.
25 See Karl Marx, Grundrisse, trans. Martin Nicolaus (New
York: Penguin Books, 1973), 501-50.
26 Ravenhill, Native Tribes, 9.

59Alice Ravenhill
Ravenhill’s antimodernist stance was further articulated as a
critical
observation of the effects of European colonization and
assimilation
policies. According to Ravenhill, pre-European Aboriginal
peoples
were
expert in fishing, hunting, canoe making and house
construction. But
the death blow was dealt to the exercise of their associated arts
and
crafts when adventurers and traders and well intentioned
missionaries
carelessly or ignorantly swept away the deeply seated customs
of a
hitherto isolated “nation of artists” … with appalling rapidity.
Grave
demoralization soon followed the introduction of hitherto
unknown
alcohol, unfamiliar trading methods and diverse factors which
left –
after a short period of attempted self-defence – a bewildered,
irritated
people faced with the loss of their lands, their familiar methods
of self
support, their religion, from which sprang stimulus to their arts
and
not least, their self respect.27
Her conviction that revitalizing indigenous arts and crafts was

necessary
to the overall well-being of indigenous Canadians was further
voiced
as a more specific protest against Canadian dia policy,
particularly the
Indian day and residential school systems.28 Ravenhill argued
that, in
Canadian Indian schools: “the children are confronted with
unknown
subjects in an unknown language – diverse from their own
picturesque
forms of expression; a process described by Sir George Maxwell
in 1942
out of his wide experience as ‘crippling and destroying a
people’s soul;
fatal to self-respect and inducing in the individual contempt for
his
own race.’”29 In light of her background, it is not surprising
that, for
Ravenhill, the solution to these problems was the revival of
indigenous
arts and crafts. Ravenhill and the Society for the Furtherance of
British
Columbia Indian Arts and Crafts focused primarily on children,
and
28 Ravenhill was one of many individuals, both Aboriginal and
non-Aboriginal, who demanded
reform of the Indian educational system in Canada. Children
who attended the schools,
their parents, chiefs, and reformers like Ravenhill resisted,
protested, and advocated for
change throughout the twentieth century. For residential schools
and resistance, see Celia

Haig-Brown, Resistance and Renewal: Surviving the Indian
Residential School (Vancouver:
Tillicum Library, 1988); and J.R. Miller, Shingwauk’s Vision:
A History of Native Residential
Schools (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996).
29 Ravenhill, “Formation,” 6. Sir George Maxwell worked for
the British civil service in Malaya,
eventually taking the post of chief secretary of the Federated
Malay States from 1921 to 1926.
When Ravenhill wrote this passage in 1945, British colonial
rule over Malaya was in the
process of being dissolved as a result of opposition by the
Malay people. The Federation of
Malaya was established in 1948, and Malaysia gained
independence from Britain in 1957, with
an indigenous Islamic government. See Sir William George
Maxwell, The Civil Defence of
Malaya (London: Hutchinson and Co., 1944).
bc studies60
on the revitalization of arts and crafts in Indian schools,
because they
believed that innate artistic talents were most recoverable, and
responsive
to nurturing, in children.
Ravenhill was influenced by other intellectual currents. Her ap-
proach assumed a belief in racial essentialism. She assumed that
the
knowledge and skill required to produce authentic indigenous
arts
and crafts derived from an inherent indigenous essence. In a
section

of Native Tribes entitled “The Study of Racial Origins,” she
explains
that race is studied along four lines: prehistoric remains,
anatomical
and physical characteristics, language, and “the type and
standards
of culture revealed in a people’s customs and arts.”30 This idea
that
the arts are representative of some kind of racial essence was
similarly
articulated by one representative of the dia. In a public
statement to
promote Ravenhill’s 1944 publication of Corner Stone, R.A.
Hoey of the
dia office in Ottawa declared on behalf of the dia: “We believe
… that
Canadian Indians have a real contribution to make to the
prosperity
of the Dominion … by the exercise of their innate gifts of
conception,
technique and intelligence.” In the book itself, Ravenhill
similarly
declares:
Give an Indian boy a pot of paint and a brush and watch results.
Without Art School or instruction in method or style, animals,
trees,
mountains are stored in his mind, alive, and ready to spring out
and
express themselves in their own vitality and style, stored up by
close
observation and retentive memory, often constituting an integral
part
of his life, ready for expression at a moment’s notice.31
Although a philanthropic sense of duty was an underlying

motivation for
both, the dia officials had traditionally favoured policies of
assimilation,
while Ravenhill favoured a return to the racial and cultural
essence of
the indigenous person through arts and crafts.32
While a lack of funding meant that government policy did not
always
materialize into practice, Ravenhill’s brand of arts and crafts
ideology,
with its focus on revitalization rather than museum-like
preservation
and assimilation, was slowly being integrated into the official
workings
of the dia during the interwar years. A dia anthropological
division
was established in 1936, and experts like Diamond Jenness,
Douglas
Leechman, and Marius Barbeau acted as consultants. The
following
30 Ravenhill, “Formation,” 13-14.
31 Ravenhill, Corner Stone, 1, 2.
32 Ravenhill to the Community Drama Branch, Adult Education
Department, Victoria, 12 June
1940, bciac Papers, bca.
61Alice Ravenhill
year, “the revival and advancement of Indian handicraft”
became official
government policy, but assistance from the federal government
was

confined almost exclusively to Ontario and Quebec. The reason
given for
this was as follows: “Indian handicraft projects, to be
successful, impose
upon the Department an obligation to provide constant
supervision
and this obligation has until now confined efforts largely to
reserves in
Eastern Canada.”33 But, by 1940, the efforts of reformers like
Ravenhill
to promote regional artistic accomplishments outside of central
Canada
had gained the attention of dia officials, and the production and
sale of
handicrafts had become official (if underfunded) policy on a
national
scale.34
“The Remarkable Gifts of Francois Baptiste”35
In addition to her publications and her success lobbying
government
officials, Ravenhill’s brief but influential work with the Society
for the
Furtherance of British Columbia Indian Arts and Crafts was
marked
by two key accomplishments – the promotion of a young
Okanagan
artist named Sis-Hu-Lk and a nativity play produced by the
children
of the Inkameep Indian Day School. Ravenhill’s two Inkameep
cam-
paigns contain all the main strands of her approach: the
importance of
revitalizing indigenous artistic production and encouraging
indigenous

economic self-sufficiency, and the centrality of racial
essentialism to
the movement. Her ally in these campaigns was Anthony
Walsh.36
Walsh was a teacher at the Inkameep Indian Day School in the
south
Okanagan Valley near the town of Oliver. They began
corresponding
in January 1939. Prior to this, both Ravenhill and Walsh had
been
working, unknown to each other, on the common project of revi-
talizing indigenous arts and crafts among indigenous children.
Born
in Ireland, Walsh had immigrated to Alberta after the First
World
War and had begun teaching at Inkameep in 1930 after several
years
working as a rancher, a forester, a cook, a berry picker, and a
clerk.
33 Canada, Sessional Papers, Annual Report of the Department
of Indian Affairs (1939-1940), 8.
34 Ibid., (1940-1941), 10-12.
35 Ravenhill to Bullock-Webster, 16 January 1940, bciac
Papers, bca.
36 For Anthony Walsh, see Andrea N. Walsh, “No Small Work:
Anthropology, Art, and
Children,” paper presented at the Canadian Anthropology
Society Meeting, 9 May 2003,
Halifa x, Nova Scotia. See also http://w w w.museevirtuel-
virtualmuseum.ca /sgc-cms/
expositions-exhibitions/inkameep; and Thomas Fleming, Lisa
Smith, and Helen Raptis,
“An Accidental Teacher: Anthony Walsh and the Aboriginal
Day Schools at Six Mile Creek

and Inkameep, British Columbia, 1929-1942,” Historical
Studies in Education 19, 1 (2007): 2-24.
bc studies62
He gained the cooperation of Chief Baptiste George, as well as
some
of the parents of his students, in the task of revitalizing
indigenous arts
and crafts. As well as providing time during school hours for art
and
literary pursuits, Walsh encouraged his students to collect
Okanagan
legends and stories from their parents, which they then
reinterpreted
as plays. With Walsh’s guidance and the help of their parents,
the
children made costumes and performed these dramas. Starting in
1939, Ravenhill promoted Inkameep’s artistic endeavours in
Vancouver
and Victoria, and the Inkameep school gained some notoriety
within
Figure 2. Anthony Walsh, n.d. Image I-61892 courtesy of
Royal British Columbia Museum, BC Archives.
63Alice Ravenhill
British Columbia. Both Sis-Hu-Lk and the nativity play came
from
Inkameep and attracted significant publicity in the early 1940s,
when

the Vancouver Sun heralded Inkameep as “one of the last
strongholds of
Canada’s Indian culture.” 37 International recognition soon
followed. In
1945, the Inkameep school won honours at the Exhibition of
Drawings
and Paintings held annually by the Royal Drawing Society of
London,
and its work was among those selected to show the King and
Queen at
Buckingham Palace at the first Exhibit of Canadian Children’s
Art.38
37 Vancouver Sun, 14 April 1940, clipping in bciac Papers, bca.
Figure 3. Sis-Hu-Lk, n.d. Image C-06211 courtesy of Royal
British
Columbia Museum, BC Archives.
bc studies64
Central to this revival was Walsh’s student and protégé, Sis-
Hu-Lk,
whose English name was Francois Baptiste. Sis-Hu-Lk was the
grandson
of Chief Baptiste George, who died at the age of ninety-two in
1939,
eight months after Ravenhill and Walsh began their
correspondence.
He lived, according to his obituary in the Family Herald and
Weekly
Star, “to see the beginning of the revival of that culture among
his own
people, due to his wisdom and foresight.”39 Born in 1921 at

Inkameep,
Sis-Hu-Lk’s talent for drawing and painting was recognized
early on by
his family and community, including his teacher. A studio was
built for
him on the reserve, and, for a brief period in 1940, he was sent
to study
at an Indian school for art in Santa Fe, New Mexico.40
Ravenhill was
instrumental in promoting Sis-Hu-Lk in British Columbia,
Ontario,
Quebec, and Europe as “a BC full-blooded Indian and a young
artist
of promise and distinction.”41
Sis-Hu-Lk drew and painted animals – horses, squirrels and
skunks,
mountain sheep and deer, eagles, wild geese, and quail. These
creatures
were rendered primarily in black and white, in a realistic but
somewhat
two-dimensional fashion. In January 1940, Ravenhill persuaded
Lady
Tweedsmuir to send several of Sis-Hu-Lk’s pieces to the
National Art
Gallery in Ottawa.42 The response Ravenhill received from
Arthur
Lismer, educational advisor for the gallery, was encouraging.
Lismer
suggested the possibility of an “exhibition of Indian Artists’
paintings
in which Sis-hu-lk’s work [would] predominate.” He was
impressed
with Sis-Hu-Lk’s work but was not willing to go so far as to
agree with
Ravenhill’s idea that the indigenous person’s inherent artistic
talent

should be left to flourish with as little outside interference as
possible.
For Ravenhill, artistic talent was part of the innate racial
essence of
indigenous peoples and was of value for its primitive,
spontaneous, and
simplistic aesthetic.43 Lismer agreed that Sis-Hu-Lk’s style was
“a racial
characteristic,” but it was one that did not align with “a white
man’s idea
of anything that appears ‘decorative’ in line and motive,” and
he was
“not so certain that [Sis-Hu-Lk] should be left ‘natural’ and
untrained.”44
39 Family Herald and Weekly Star, 2 October 1940, clipping in
bciac Papers, bca.
40 Daily Colonist, 30 May 1941, clipping in bciac Papers, bca.
41 Ravenhill to J. Harry Smith, Press Manager, cpr, Montreal,
19 June 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
42 Ravenhill to Bullock-Webster, 16 January 1940, bciac
Papers, bca.
43 Ravenhill’s ideas about aesthetic and artistic development
fall in line with the early-to
mid-twentieth-century Modernist art movement, which
celebrated “qualities of immediacy,
spontaneity, purity, and indeed innocence” that were termed
“Primitive.” In this Modernist
perspective, “Primitive Art” came from the artist’s unconscious
and was closely linked to
children’s creative expressions. See Walsh, “No Small Work,”
2.
44 Arthur Lismer to Ravenhill, 20 July 1940, University of
British Columbia Special Collections
(hereafter Ravenhill Fonds, ubcsc).

65Alice Ravenhill
The exhibit was never to happen because Sis-Hu-Lk, who was
then
nineteen years old and also working as a rancher with his
family, did not
produce the larger works that the gallery commissioned.
Nonetheless, he
did gain some local and national attention, and he brought
indigenous
arts and crafts into the public eye.
In June of 1940, Ravenhill arranged an exhibit for Sis-Hu-Lk at
the
Windermere Hotel in Victoria. Reviews were favourable. One
newspaper
lauded his drawings and paintings as being “marked by vitality
and
spontaneity, and reflect[ing] the characteristic Indian qualities
of keen
observation and memory which is accurate and
impressionable.”45
Another pointed to his “vivid realism and a strong sense of
decorative
design, which promise[d] to carry him into the ranks of
foremost
Canadian artists.”46 Sis-Hu-Lk received several commissions
from
this exhibit, which, like the National Gallery commissions, he
never
fulfilled.47 No records from Sis-Hu-Lk himself remain in the
archives,
and his reasons for shunning the art world can only be inferred.
His

work as a cattle rancher certainly would have inhibited his
ability to
produce larger pieces, which would have taken more time from
paid work
45 Daily Colonist, 23 June 1940, clipping in bciac Papers, bca.
46 Victoria Daily Times, 1 July 1940, clipping in bciac Papers,
bca.
47 Ravenhill to Walsh, 3 August 1940, Ravenhill Fonds, ubcsc.
Figure 4. Painting by Sis-Hu-Lk, “Okanagan Nation” n.d. Image
C-06220 courtesy of Royal
British Columbia Museum, BC Archives.
bc studies66
than he could afford to spare. Ravenhill repeatedly cited “lack
of funds”
as an impediment to Sis-Hu-Lk’s development as a professional
artist.48
This possibly explains why Sis-Hu-Lk never fulfilled his
commission
or his artistic potential. In contrast to George Raley’s vision of
a
“revival of Indian art and handicraft as a welfare movement,”
Ravenhill
focused primarily on educational reform.49 She did, however,
also view
indigenous arts and crafts as a possible economic motor. In a
bid to gain
the support of dia officials, Ravenhill pitched her mission as
having
the potential effect of “stimulating a gradual revival of their
former
handicrafts among some of our Indians now on Relief as to

preserve for
our Province some of its unique arts while restoring these
dependent
people to at least a measure of self-support.”50 Her motive here
was to
encourage economic self-sufficiency among indigenous people
while at
the same time reviving the traditional arts. These aims,
however, were
often economically unfeasible. For Sis-Hu-Lk, whose artistic
endeavours
generated such a meagre hourly wage that his productivity
suffered
when other work was available, practical realities intruded upon
his
career as an artist. Nonetheless, indigenous artisans and
craftspeople
had a long-standing tradition of selling their wares, even if
sporadically,
and arts and crafts were a standard element of the economy of
many
indigenous communities.51
As well as imagining its economic possibilities, reformers and
dia
officials alike encouraged the continued production of
indigenous arts
and crafts for moral purposes – essentially, to redress the injury
wrought
by colonization. The loss of indigenous cultures, reflected in
the loss of
traditional arts and crafts, was understood to be an outcome of
coloni-
zation and settlement. For Ravenhill, the revitalization of Indian
arts
and crafts was a moral responsibility with national
repercussions – one

that had the power to “knit more closely together members of
our
own country and Commonwealth.”52 Thus, the project of
marketing
indigenous arts and crafts in British Columbia was carried out
with
considerable passion as well as with careful direction. For
example,
Ravenhill worked closely with Walsh and the children at
Inkameep to
produce Christmas cards for sale to the non-indigenous market.
On the
one hand, Ravenhill provided detailed instruction as to the
technique
48 Ravenhill to Webster, 16 January 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
49 Hawker, Ghosts, 74.
50 Ravenhill to MacKay, 28 May 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
51 Society for the Furtherance of British Columbia Indian Arts
and Crafts, Report of the
Committee on Indian Arts and Crafts, September 1934, bciac
Papers, bca.
52 Ravenhill to MacKay, 28 May 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
67Alice Ravenhill
and subject of these cards: she identified the images to be used
on the
front of the cards, instructed that a “thumbnail sketch of the
tepee”
be used as background on the inside of the cards, and stressed
the
importance of using colour in the illustrations. On the other

hand, she
also emphasized the importance of authenticity, of allowing the
children
to produce original work and “establishing individuality in both
the
pictorial (outside) message and also in the words used.”53
Another project
initiated by Walsh involved a radio production entitled “Songs
by the
Boys and Girls of the Inkameep Indian School.”54 However,
Ravenhill
and Walsh’s most successful effort at marketing arts and crafts
for a
non-indigenous consumer market was probably The Tale of the
Nativity.
The Tale of the Nativity was originally staged as a play by the
students at
Inkameep Indian School in the winter of 1939. It was published
in book
form the following summer, with illustrations by Sis-Hu-Lk.
Both the
stage production and the book met with a significant degree of
media
attention and interest from the non-indigenous public. This
nativity
play was set in the Okanagan Valley, and much attention was
placed
on the regional flora and fauna that appeared in the production.
In the
script, Mary and Joseph take shelter in a cave, where Jesus is
born with
the help of a gathering of talking animals – a deer, a fawn,
rabbits, and
chickadees. The miraculous healing of “a cripple” by the baby
Jesus is
incorporated into the tale, as is the weaving of rush mats, a visit

from
three Great Chiefs, and references to the Old Shaman and the
Great
Spirit. The people in this play live in lodges, eat fish and deer
meat,
wear fur robes, and fall asleep to the owl’s hoot and the
coyote’s howl.
The play was performed for the public on several occasions
throughout
the year. One audience member described the stage as being
decorated
with “fir boughs, sage brush, wild rose bushes, birds and
animals,”
and the cave as being “homelike and natural to the Indian
child.” This
performance was lauded for its “native simplicity,” a hallmark
descriptor
of antimodernist discourse.55 For example, the journalist Edna
Kells
commented: “Simplicity, in fact, is the keynote of all the
artistic effort
which has carried their [indigenous peoples’] fame.”56 For his
part, Bob
53 “Inkameep Children’s Drama: On the Production of
Christmas Cards” (1942), Ravenhill
Fonds, ubcsc. For “authenticity,” see Paige Raibmon, Authentic
Indians: Episodes of Encounter
from the Late Nineteenth Century Northwest Coast (Durham:
Duke University Press, 2005).
54 “Inkameep Children’s Drama: Songs by the Boys and Girls
of the Inkameep Indian School,
Oliver, British Columbia – Radio” (n.d.), Ravenhill Fonds,
ubcsc.

55 British Columbia Catholic, December 1940, bciac Papers,
bca.
56 Family Herald and Weekly Star, 2 October 1940, bciac
Papers, bca.
bc studies68
Lowe of the Vancouver Sun asserted: “The beauty of their work
lies in
its simplicity.”57
Published in Victoria by the Society for the Furtherance of
British
Columbia Indian Arts and Crafts in August 1940, the Tale of the
Na-
tivity booklet consisted of nineteen pages with eight
illustrations by
Sis-Hu-Lk and was priced at twenty-five cents. The proceeds
from the
booklet were to be “devoted to the remuneration of Sis-Hu-Lk
for his
illustrations and to a fund to enable the committee to carry
further
these objects, and thus contribute to Canadian culture.”58 The
British
Columbia Catholic Review, which recommended wide
circulation of
the booklet among Catholics in the province, described the story
as
having emanated “from the minds of children of the first
Canadians.”59
The Tale of the Nativity was sold to the non-indigenous
consumer not
only as an expression of “naïve simplicity,”60 whose
illustrations were of

a “purely native style,”61 but also as a work that was distinctly
Canadian.
The apparent incongruity of promoting indigenous
“authenticity”
through the single most important legend of Christianity, equal
only to
the story of the crucifixion, appears to have gone largely
uncontested,
and both the play and the booklet were a resounding success.
After Ravenhill retired from her position with the Society for
the
Furtherance of British Columbia Indian Arts and Crafts, the
organi-
zation continued, even more effectively, to promote the work of
young
artists, primarily through museum exhibitions. In the 1940s, the
society
was most notable in promoting George Clutesi, the Tseshaht
painter
who gained significant notoriety as an artist, writer, actor, and
activist.62
During the late 1940s and 1950s, the renamed British Columbia
Indian
Arts and Welfare Society also provided a platform for
politically active
indigenous artists like Ellen Neel and Mungo Martin to exhibit
both
their artwork and their politics.63 These exhibitions often
contrasted
older artefacts with newer works and challenged the notion of
the
“Vanishing Indian” by demonstrating both consistency and
change
in indigenous arts and crafts. Whereas philanthropy motivated
non-
indigenous reformers like Ravenhill and Walsh, as well as

others like
Maisie Hurley and George Raley, for many indigenous artists
and
57 Vancouver Sun, 14 April 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
58 Alice Ravenhill, Review of The Tale of the Nativity,
Northwest Bookshelf (1941): 84-85.
59 British Columbia Catholic, December 1940, bciac Papers,
bca.
60 Daily Colonist, 3 December 1940, bciac Papers, bca.
61 Miscellaneous magazine clipping, no title, n.d., bciac Papers,
bca.
62 For Clutesi, see George Clutesi, Stand Tall, My Son
(Victoria: Newport Bay Publishers, 1990).
63 For Neel and Martin, see Phil Nuytten, The Totem Carvers:
Charlie James, Ellen Neel, Mungo
Martin (Vancouver: Panorama Publications, 1982).
69Alice Ravenhill
communities the motivation behind revitalizing their artistic
traditions
was political.64
Ravenhill had some unexpected mid-century political influence.
In the final years of the Second World War, both the provincial
and
federal branches of the Native Brotherhood, the foremost
intertribal
indigenous organization in this period, became increasingly
activist.65
The rhetoric of human rights and social justice that the war
produced
contributed to this rising tide of protest. Debates over

enfranchisement
and compulsory military service were fuelled by the British
Columbia
Native Brotherhood’s public nationalist statements of support
for the
war, as “the real Canadians.”66 The North American Indian
Broth-
erhood (naib), which was born out of the Native Brotherhoods
in 1944,
advocated for representation of “the Indians of Canada” in
Parliament,
a Royal Commission to revise the Indian Act, and “a new deal
for the
indigenouss [sic] of this great country.”67 In 1950, the British
Columbia
Indian Arts and Welfare Society and its “distinguished founder,
Dr.
Alice Ravenhill,” were officially recognized by Indian Time
magazine,
a national indigenous rights publication whose leadership
overlapped
with the leadership of the naib and included Maisie Hurley.68
Indian
Time and the naib represented the genesis of national-level
political
mobilization and organization in Canada at the end of the
Second World
War. This was a defining moment in the indigenous rights
movement,
and in these formative years cultural revival through the arts
and crafts
provided one of the foundations of a unified and politicized
indigenous
identity.
64 As Hawker argues, the interwar period marks a transition to

increased government and
non-indigenous control over the production, distribution, and
consumption of indigenous
art and imagery. However, as Leslie Dawn points out, this
manipulation occurred within a
context of “internal contradictions and external opposition,” of
land claims and assertions of
identity that “threatened to destabilize what had long been held
as foundational truths for the
discipline of ethnography, for the principles of museum
collecting, for enacting government
policies and legislation, and for acquiring territories.” See
Hawker, Ghosts; Leslie Dawn,
National Visions, National Blindness: Canadian Art and
Identities in the 1920s (Vancouver: ubc
Press, 2006), 272.
65 For the Native Brotherhood, see Paul Tennant, Aboriginal
Peoples and Politics: The Indian Land
Question in British Columbia, 1849-1989 (Vancouver: ubc
Press, 1990), 114-24.
66 Alfred Adams, President, Native Brotherhood of British
Columbia, Vancouver Office, to the
Officers and Members of the Native Brotherhood of BC, 7
February 1945, bciac Papers, bca.
67 Andrew Paull, North American Indian Brotherhood, Grand
National Convention Call,
16 July 1945, bciac, bca. For a recent account of Andrew
Paull’s life and career, see Brendan
Edwards, “‘I Have Lots of Help behind Me, Lots of Books, to
Convince You’: Andrew Paull
and the Value of Literacy in English,” BC Studies 164
(2009/10): 7-30.

68 Doug Wilkinson, pub., Indian Time (Vancouver), November
1950.
bc studies70
Conclusion
Starting in 1947, the University of British Columbia and the
Provincial
Museum of Natural History and Anthropology turned their
attention
to restoring totem poles from the Northwest Coast region. The
project
involved many indigenous peoples, including Mungo Martin,
Ellen
Neel, and Bill Reid. In 1959, Reid was commissioned by the
University of
British Columbia to duplicate a series of thirty totem and house
poles.69
By this time, Reid had absorbed Ravenhill’s carefully collected
and
replicated designs, and her inspirational as well as intelligent
writings.
She had hoped Sis-Hu-Lk would achieve provincial and national
recognition as an artist in the 1940s, but only in the following
decades
would social conditions welcome an artist of Bill Reid’s
ambition and
stature. Thanks, in part, to Ravenhill’s groundbreaking and
committed
work with the Society for the Furtherance of British Columbia
Indian
Arts and Crafts, and to her literary and teaching abilities,
mainstream

audiences in British Columbia were prepared for the postwar
Aboriginal
arts and craft resurgence, and her activism was recognized by
postwar
leaders of human rights and social justice. Ravenhill was
awarded an
honorary doctorate by the University of British Columbia in
1948, six
years before her death. Her cultural importance continues to be
felt.
69 Tippett, Bill Reid, 105-22.
3/29/2020 Soil Nitrogen and Sulfur (Chapter 13) Notes -
AGRI1050R50: Introduction to Soil Science (2020S)
https://gotoclass.tnecampus.org/d2l/le/content/8094442/viewCo
ntent/60403422/View 1/14
Soil Nitrogen and Sulfur (Chapter 13) Notes
Soil Nitrogen and Sulfur (Chapter 13) Notes
Did you know ....
Did you know that nitrogen is commonly the most limiting
nutrient in agronomic settings? Chapter 11 begins
our journey through the major plant limiting nutrients and their
cycles in soil discussing why nitrogen is most
limiting, how nitrogen cycles in soil, and then reviewing similar
information for sulfur.

Lecture content notes are accompanied by videos listed below
the notes in each submodule (e.g. Soil Nitrogen
and Sulfur (Chapter 14) Videos A though E). Print or download
lecture notes then view videos in succession
alongside lecture content and add additional notes from each
video. The start of each video is noted
in parenthesis (e.g. Content for Video A) within each lecture
note set and contains lecture content through the
note for the next video (e.g. Content for Video B).
Figures and tables unless specifically referenced are from the
course text, Nature and Property of Soils, 14th
Edition, Brady and Weil.
Content Video A
Soil Nitrogen
Nitrogen
Generally most limiting macronutrients
Yellow, Chlorotic Tissue
AGRI1050R50: Introduction to Soil Science (2020S) LH
https://gotoclass.tnecampus.org/d2l/le/content/8094442/navigate
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23968750
https://gotoclass.tnecampus.org/d2l/home/8094442

ntent/60403422/View 2/14
Necessary Requirement for High Productivity
Major Plant Component - Microbial too!
Amino Acids
Nucleic Acids
Proteins
Enzymes
Chlorophyll
Plants utilize cation, anion, and organic forms:
Ammonium – NH4+
Nitrate - NO3- - most plants prefer
Low Molecular Weight Organics – proteins and amino acids
Nitrogen in Soil
Atmosphere 78% N2 gas
N≡N – Triple Bond, Inert
Transform into Reactive Species
Lightening

Microbial Fixation
NO3-, NH4+, Organics
Soil N – generally low amounts plant available
SOM – degradation makes available
Fixed in minerals
Inorganics – Very Soluble – Easy to Loose!
Nitrogen Cycle
Nitrogen Cycle
ntent/60403422/View 3/14
Soil and Environmental Quality, 2nd Edition, Pierzynski, et al.
Components of the Nitrogen Cycle
Inputs

ntent/60403422/View 4/14
Inputs
N Fixation
Atmospheric Deposition
Commercial Fertilizers
Transformations
Mineralization
Immobilization
Nitrification
Denitrification
Losses
Denitrification
Leaching
Erosion
Ammonia Volatilization
Fixation by Clays
Plant Uptake

Content Video B
Nitrogen Inputs
Lightening
Breaks apart triple bonds
Gaseous forms of N, then Nitrates
Come back to surface: rain, snow, dust, etc.
Atmospheric Nitrogen Deposition
Industry and CAFO
SOX –NOX gasses
Problem for forests and aquatic life
Industrial Fixation of Nitrogen Gas to Ammonia
Extreme Pressure and Heat
Haber-Bosh – Germans – World War I
Thought to be one of the greatest developments of the 20th
century
Move from organic N to synthetic N – Huge boost productivity
Inputs: Biological Nitrogen Fixation
Conversion of Atmospheric N2 into Organic N
Symbiotic

23968765
ntent/60403422/View 5/14
Symbiotic
Legumes – Bacteria
Non-Legumes – Actinomycetes
Independent – Cyanobacteria and Heterotrophic Bacteria
Catalyst – Nitrogenase Enzyme
Requires LOTS of Energy – Plant association plus
Destroyed by oxygen – Protect in nodule – Leghemoglobin
Soybean Root Nodules – Bradyrhizobium

ntent/60403422/View 6/14
https://www.pioneer.com/home/site/about/template.CONTENT/
guid.F3A614D9-9AF1-AC5A-B4FC-
E064EBF7BB38/
http://www.agweb.com/article/bacteria_give_beans_a_boost/
Nitrogen Cycle
https://www.pioneer.com/home/site/about/template.CONTENT/
guid.F3A614D9-9AF1-AC5A-B4FC-E064EBF7BB38/
http://www.agweb.com/article/bacteria_give_beans_a_boost/
ntent/60403422/View 7/14
Content Video C
Mineralization and Immobilization
Mineralization – Conversion of Organic to Inorganic Forms
Immobilization – Conversion of Inorganic to Organic Forms
Transformations: Mineralization
Conversion of Organic N to Inorganic N
Organic N – “Bioparticles” and SOM

Proteins, Amino Acids, Ammine (Organic w/ NH2)
Indigenous N sources (SOM), crop residues, or manure
Microbial community yield energy w/ change of oxidation state
N
N for growth and provide plant available N
SOM ~5% N – 1 to 3 % SOM degraded/yr
Soil with 2% SOM – 2,000 kg N/ha (1780 lbs/acre)
2% Mineralized/year – 40 kg N/ha (36 lbs/acre) <Generous>
Much lower than high value crop needs – Add commercial N
fertilizer
Transformations: Immobilization
Conversion of Inorganic N to Organic N
Opposite of Mineralization
23968842
ntent/60403422/View 8/14
Microbial Assimilation

Microbial community then goes to work on organic C
Mineralization – Immobilization Simultaneous
Nutritional Balance and Soil Conditions Dictate
Transformations: C:N Ratios
C:N Ratio > 30 – Net Immobilization
Microbes using N for own use; not adding to system
C:N Ratio < 20 – Net Mineralization
Microbes able to use C and N, cycle, build SOM, add N back to
system
Implications
Composing with High C:N
Mulches
Wheat Straw Degradation
Transformations: Nitrification
Nitrification: Bacterial Oxidation of NH4+ to NO3-
Conditions right and bacteria available – RAPID –
Chemoautotrophs
Warm, Moist soil
Ammonium
Oxygen

Nitrite is toxic to plants
Reaction same – No matter what N source - mineralization,
manure, commercial fertilizer
Source of acidity – H+
Content Video D
Transformation/Loss: Denitrification
Denitrification: Reduction of NO3- to Gaseous Forms N
Anaerobic Conditions
Wet conditions – Saturated soils after big rain can have
anaerobic zones in hours
Microsites in colloids
Heterotrophic – Facultative Anaerobes
NO3- Terminal Electron Acceptor
Many soil genera: Pseudomonas, Bacillus, Micrococcus, etc.
Organic C for the microbial community
23968843

ntent/60403422/View 9/14
Organic C for the microbial community
Warm/Moist temperatures
Significant – Important LOSS of N
Con: GHC Source Pro: Wetlands, Decrease Nitrate
Loss: Ammonia Volatilization
Ammonia Volatilization – Gaseous Loss NH3↑
High pH – Alkaline soils – Force equation to the right – Greater
Loss
Urea - N Fertilizer – NH2-CO-NH2 – Surface Applied
Warm and Moist – Urea absorbs moisture – Forms Ammonia
Gas – LOSS
Problematic only for ~2 week period after application
Urea levels high in animal manure – Manage – Can
inject/incorporate
Management Issue
Loss: Nitrate via Leaching, Runoff, Erosion
Nitrate - NO3- - Anion
Mechanisms of Loss
Plant uptake (Ideal)

Leaches thru profile with water (Organic N too)
Transported in runoff water (NH4+ too)
Transported in soil with erosion (NH4+ too)
Environmental and Health Issue
Eutrophication – Excess nutrients in water
Drinking water - Nitrate metabolism products harmful
Chesapeake Bay
Dead Zone in the Gulf
N Loss: Fixation in Clays
NH4+ - Cation
Attracted to negative charges in soil colloids
Fixation
Similar in size to K
2:1 Expanding clays – Vermiculite
Fixed in Interlayers – Unavailable
More Clay with depth – More fixation
Content Video E
Nitrogen Cycle

23968844
ntent/60403422/View 10/14
Management of N
Commercial Fertilizer Industry
“Insurance Fertilizer”
Paradigm Shift
N Fertilizer Cost HIGH
Severe Environmental Ramifications
Precision Agriculture
Urban Issues
Golf Courses
Small Yards
Nitrogen Cycle

ntent/60403422/View 11/14
Nitrogen Cycle
4 Major Transformations
Mineralization / Immobilization
Nitrification
Denitrification
Nitrogen (N2) Fixation
What is happening to the N itself?
Why is it happening?
When does it occur?
How does it occur?
Where/when might you expect this to occur?
And who is doing the transformation?
Content Video F
Soil Sulfur
https://www.pioneer.com/home/site/us/agronomy/library/templa
te.CONTENT/guid.7786411D-9BC0-C084-8A66-

CC7BE3A9C8E9
Sulfur
Secondary Macronutrient
23968845
https://www.pioneer.com/home/site/us/agronomy/library/templa
te.CONTENT/guid.7786411D-9BC0-C084-8A66-
CC7BE3A9C8E9
ntent/60403422/View 12/14
Decrease in sulfur containing compounds – fertilizers,
pesticides, emissions, etc.
Somewhat limited in agronomic soils
Essential nutrient – biological systems
Amino Acids
Vitamins
Enzymes
Hormones
Cabbage and onions – Aromatics w/ Sulfur – Smell and Taste

Sulfur in Soil
Sulfur Availability:
Majority in SOM
Parent Materials – Weather – Gypsum
Adsorption Sulfur Dioxide Gas – Atmosphere
Plant Uptake:
Sulfate – SO4-
Sorption – Rain/Dust – Various Forms - H2S, SO2, H2SO4
Sulfur Cycle – Similar to N
Plant Sulfur Uptake
Sulfur Cycle
ntent/60403422/View 13/14
Acid Mine Drainage

ntent/60403422/View 14/14
Reflect in ePortfolio Download Print
Acid Mine Drainage
Appalachian Coal Mining – Pyrite (FeS2) Overburden
Oxygenation of metal sulfites (Pyrite and others) yields
tremendous amounts of acid
Thiobacillus sp. mediate process
Mining companies tasked with remediation:
Rock overburden dumped on top of the ground
Build soil structure – add organic materials
Remediate acidity – Liming materials
Re-vegetate
West Virginia - Acid Mine Drainage
http://www.dep.wv.gov/WWE/getinvolved/sos/Pages/AMD.aspx
Review Sulfur
Why is sulfur an important nutrient?
Task: View this topic
Activity Details

http://www.dep.wv.gov/WWE/getinvolved/sos/Pages/AMD.aspx
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3/29/2020 Soil Phosphorus and Potassium (Chapter 14) Notes -
ntent/60403429/View 1/10
Soil Phosphorus and Potassium (Chapter 14) Notes
Soil Phosphorus and Potassium (Chapter 14) Notes
Did you know ....
Did you know there is an area in the Gulf of Mexico where
animals and plants cannot live due to high levels of
nutrients? Chapter 14 moves us down the nutrient line to
discuss phosphorus and potassium in soils including
eutrophication which contributes to the Dead Zone in the Gulf.
the notes in each submodule (e.g. Soil
Phosphorus and Potassium (Chapter 14) Videos A though D).
Print or download lecture notes then view videos
in succession alongside lecture content and add additional notes
from each video. The start of each video is
noted in parenthesis (e.g. Content for Video A) within each
lecture note set and contains lecture content
through the note for the next video (e.g. Content for Video B).

Content Video A
Soil Phosphorus
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/dead_zone.html
Phosphorus
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http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/dead_zone.html
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p
Essential Element

Energy Molecule – ATP
DNA/RNA
Phospholipids
Plant
Photosynthesis, Flowering/Fruiting, Root Growth, Meristem
Deficiency: Stunted growth, weak stem, dark blue/green
Mobile in plant – moves old to young tissues
Plant Uptake – Low, Low P in soil solution
HP042- or H2PO4-
Phosphorus and Soil Fertility
Conundrum:
Total P low (200 to 2000 kg/ha in upper 15 cm)
P Compounds in soil not plant available and insoluble
Added P (fertilize, manures) become unavailable too
Environmental Quality
Underdeveloped Countries – Lack of P fertilizer, limits crop
production
P Enrichment and Loss – Eutrophication
Content Video B
Phosphorus Cycle
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Phosphorus Cycle
Weathering P minerals primary source – Inorganic
Parent materials and weathering degree dictate sources
Apatites (Ca-Alkaline) vs Fe/Al Oxides (Hi Weathered –Acidic)
Soluble P in solution – Low - 0.001 to 1 ml/L
Ion Dictated by soil pH – HP042- or H2PO4-
Fixation P – Strong – Not exchangeable
Movement to roots is SLOW
Mass Flow
Water
Mycorrhizae
Losses P
No real gaseous loss
Plant Uptake
Leaching not huge issue – strong affinity colloids
Erosion/Runoff - major environmental loss mechanism under
right conditions
Phosphorus and pH

ntent/60403429/View 4/10
Inorganic P Fixation
More on Fixation
Fixation Capacity in Soils
ntent/60403429/View 5/10
P Availability Soil Orders
Organic Sources of P
Organic P – SOM
1/10 to ¼ of N levels
Mineralization C:P< 200:1
Important in Hi Weathered Soils even with Low SOM
Inositol Phosphates
Enzymes
Phytic Acid – P grain storage

Non-Ruminants – hogs and chickens - cannot process
Add to animal feed – high P levels in manure
Organic P
More soluble - less fixation than inorganic P
Greater likelihood loss in leaching, runoff
Over application of organic forms P – manure
Content Video C
Point Source vs Non-Point Source Pollution
Point Source – Identifiable source of discharge
Emission, Solids, Liquids
Wastewater treatment facilities, industry
Non-Point Source – Unidentifiable source of discharge
Nutrients and Pathogens
Agriculture, Septic Tanks, Urban Discharge
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Forms of P in Runoff
Form of P Name Description
TP Total Phosphorus Total P in Runoff
Volume

TSP Total Soluble P Orthophosphates and
Organic P
SP Soluble P Soluble forms of
Inorganic P
SOP Soluble Organic P Soluble forms of
Organic P
PP Particulate P Total P in Sediment
BAP Bioavailable P Total P Readily
Available
Eutrophication
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/edexcel/prob
lems_in_environment/pollutionrev4.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/edexcel/prob
lems_in_environment/pollutionrev4.shtml
ntent/60403429/View 7/10
http://extension.usu.edu/waterquality/htm/agriculturewq
Managing P
Apply P to meet plant needs – Do not over apply P
Apply in combination with N fertilizers

N fertilizers create acidity locally, keeps soluble, plant
available
Apply in band as Starter Fertilizer
Minimizes surface area for fixation
Make plant available early, minimize loss
Enhance cycling of organic P
Cover crops – Build SOM, etc.
Mycorrhizal Symbiosis
Control soil pH – Near-neutral for max solubility
Minimize tillage – Decrease loss runoff/erosion
Buffer/Filter Strips – Catch P/N in runoff water/sediments
Content Video D
Soil Potassium
http://www.extension.umn.edu/agriculture/nutrient-
management/potassium/potassium-for-crop-production/
management/potassium/potassium-for-crop-
http://extension.usu.edu/waterquality/htm/agriculturewq
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production/
Potassium
Essential Element
Not incorporated into structures
Enzyme Activator
Plant
Osmotic water potential – aids with water loss
Photosynthesis, Protein Synthesis, N Fixation
*Environmental Stress – Drought tolerance, winter hardiness,
better resistance to fungal disease and
insect pest.
1 to 4% Healthy Plant Tissue (Similar to N)
Deficiency: Yellow spots on leaf edge, look burned/ragged
Plant Uptake – Generally large total quantities in soil, low
availability
K+ ion in soil solution
Potassium Cycle
Liming and Soil K
Maintaining Neutral pH with Lime

ntent/60403429/View 9/10
Maintaining Neutral pH with Lime
K+ more readily replace Ca2+ and Mg2+ (neutral) than Al3+
(acidic)
Keeps K+ in soil profile
Potassium (K) Cycle
Additions
Weathering parent materials and exchange on soil colloids
Not associated with SOM
Much total K not available: low solubility and fixation
Fertilizer needed in cropping systems
Losses
Leaching – Greater in acidic conditions
Crop Uptake - Big loss
Luxury Consumption
No gaseous loss
Forms of K in Soils
Pools dependent on parent material, clay content, CEC
Primary Mineral Structure – Micas/Feldspars
90-98% total soil K
SLOWLY available – relatively unavailable pool
Non-Exchangeable K – Fixed in Clays

ntent/60403429/View 10/10
Reflect in ePortfolio Download Print
Non-Exchangeable K – Fixed in Clays
1-10% total K
Slowly available
Readily Available
0.1 to 0.2% Soil
Solution
K
1 to 2% Readily Exchangeable K – Soil Colloids
K Fixation
Amount determined clay and pH
1:1 (Kaolinite) – Very little fixation
2:1 Clays (Vermiculite especially) – High levels of fixation
pH

Liming increases fixation
Closer to the soil colloids – 2:1 clays fixation
Managing Soil K
Crop uptake – major removal
SOIL TEST – Know what need!
Commercial Fertilizer Addition – Potash (KCl)
Maintain adequate soil solution K for particular plant needs
Many soils just need ‘maintenance K’
Highly weathered, acidic soils, or sandy soils - generally need
more commercial K
Maintain soil pH
Review P and K
What is P utilized for in the plant?
What are the plant available forms of P?
What are the challenges for P and soil fertility – both in
developed and developing countries?
What is the P Index?
Can you describe Figure 14.9 – P and pH?
Can you describe the mechanisms of P fixation – soil pH,
orders, soil colloids, etc.?
Why are organic forms of P important? Why are they more

likely to be lost to leaching than inorganic P?
Point Source vs Non-Point Source pollution
Why is erosion and runoff loss a greater issue than leaching of
P unlike N?
Define Eutrophication – why is it environmentally important?
What are some management strategies to manage soil P?
What is a buffer strip?
What role does K play in plant production?
What form of K is available for plant uptake?
What are the major additions and losses of K from the soil
system?
Task: View this topic
Activity Details
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3/29/2020 Soil Calcium, Magnesium, and Micronutrients

(Chapter 15) Notes - AGRI1050R50: Introduction to Soil
Science (2020S)
ntent/60403434/View 1/7
Soil Calcium, Magnesium, and Micronutrients
(Chapter 15) Notes
Soil Calcium, Magnesium, and Micronutrients (Chapter 15)
Notes
Did you know ....
Did you know that some nutrients for plant growth are only
needed in atom level quantities, but without them
yields can and are limited? Chapter 14 finalizes our discussion
on the macro and micronutirents in soil, and
finishes with an important discussion on nutrient management.
the notes in each submodule (e.g. Soil Calcium,
Magnesium, and Micronutrients (Chapter 15) Videos A thru C).
Print or download lecture notes then view
videos in succession alongside lecture content and add

additional notes from each video. The start of each
video is noted in parenthesis (e.g. Content for Video A) within
each lecture note set and contains lecture
content through the note for the next video (e.g. Content for
Video B).
Content Video A
Soil Calcium, Magnesium, and Micronutrients
23970628

Science (2020S)
ntent/60403434/View 2/7
http://caldwell.ces.ncsu.edu/2013/07/avoiding-blossom-end-rot/
Calcium and Magnesium
Macronutrients
Plants – Needed just under amounts of N,K
Calcium
Plants – Major component cell walls, growth, enzymes
Animals – Bones and teeth
Not generally a problem unless VERY acidic
Magnesium
Plants – Photosynthesis, enzymes, bridge for ATP
Animals – Grass Tetany

Not overly problematic – weathering/dissolution soil minerals
Availability linked to soil pH and amount of weathering
Lime – adds back from plant uptake/leaching
Calcium and Magnesium Cycles
Content Video B
Trace Element
Trace Element – Based on abundance in soils
< 100 mg/kg in soil solids or < 100 mol/L in soil solution
Micronutrient Nutrients required for plant growth but in small
quantities
http://caldwell.ces.ncsu.edu/2013/07/avoiding-blossom-end-rot/
23970631

Science (2020S)
ntent/60403434/View 3/7
Micronutrient – Nutrients required for plant growth but in small
quantities
'C-HopKinsCafe’ micronutrients (17 total)
Non-Mineral (3): C, H, O
Macros (6) : N, P, K, S,C a, Mg
Micros (8): Fe, Mn, Cl, Zn, Ni, Cu, B, Mo <Some include
Cobalt)
Micronutrients may or may not be trace elements
Macro-Micro Nutrients
http://soils.wisc.edu/facstaff/barak/soilscience326/listofel.htm
Trace Elements too
Metallomics, 2012, 4, 1017-1019
Deficient, Sufficient, or Toxic?

http://soils.wisc.edu/facstaff/barak/soilscience326/listofel.htm
Science (2020S)
ntent/60403434/View 4/7
Relative Nutrient Levels in Plants
Why the big fuss?
Intensive ag – depleted micronutrients
Less ‘contamination’ of commercial fertilizers, less
organic/manure application
Better technology – Assess deficiency/toxicity
Functions Micronutrients
Micronutrient Symptoms

Science (2020S)
ntent/60403434/View 5/7
Sources of Micronutrients
Inorganic: Soil minerals, precipitates, and clays
Organic: Bound with SOM
Micronutrient Ions in Soil

51bc studies, no. 78, Summer 3A Nation of Artists” .docx

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