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Conrad J. "Bud" Weiser Papers, 1970-2004

Overview of the Collection

Creator
Weiser, C. J. (Conrad John), 1935-
Title
Conrad J. "Bud" Weiser Papers
Dates
1970-2004 (inclusive)
Quantity
1.35 cubic feet, (3 boxes)
Collection Number
MSS Weiser
Summary
Conrad J. “Bud” Weiser (1935-) taught at Oregon State University for twenty years as a plant stress physiologist, horticulturalist, department head, and Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences. His papers relate to his career at OSU, service to the larger horticultural science profession, and broadening the concept of scholarship for faculty tenure and promotion.
Access to one folder ("Course materials - Hort 520, Research planning and organization, exam answers") is restricted until 2057 due to the presence of confidential information. For more information about access to restricted materials, please see our Guide to the Special Collections and Archives Research Center. All other materials in the collection are open.
Repository
Oregon State University Libraries, Special Collections and Archives Research Center
Special Collections and Archives Research Center
121 The Valley Library
Oregon State University
Corvallis OR
97331-4501
Telephone: 5417372075
Fax: 5417378674
scarc@oregonstate.edu
Access Restrictions

Access to one folder ("Course materials - Hort 520, Research planning and organization, exam answers") is restricted until 2057 due to the presence of confidential information. For more information about access to restricted materials, please see our Guide to the Special Collections and Archives Research Center. All other materials in the collection are open.

Languages
English
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Biographical Note

Conrad J. “Bud” Weiser (1935-) taught at Oregon State University for twenty years as a plant stress physiologist, horticulturalist, department head, and Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences.

While attending North Dakota State College, Weiser changed his major from chemistry to horticulture. He graduated in 1957 specializing in horticultural crop physiology and pathology. He earned his doctorate from Oregon State College in 1960. After his PhD, Weiser began his career at the University of Minnesota, where he established and led the Laboratory of Cold Hardiness. Even during his time at the University of Minnesota, Weiser remained in contact with faculty at OSU. In the spring of 1971, he completed a three-month sabbatical at OSU researching plant hardiness with Dr. Mal Westwood. Just before the start of school that year, Weiser and his family took a trip to visit extended family in western North Dakota. On the way home, they were involved in a car accident that killed his wife and daughter. This loss and OSU calling to see if he would be interested in returning, led to Weiser making the decision to leave Minnesota. In 1973, he accepted the position as head of the Horticulture Department at OSU. In 1987, he was honored as a distinguished professor. He assumed the position of Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences in 1991 until his retirement in 1993.

OSU’s Horticultural Department was recognized as one of the top five departments in the United States during the eighteen years Weiser was its head. He established a 70-member industry board to advise the department and established collaborative tri-state horticultural programs in the Pacific Northwest. During this period, Weiser also served on national science policy boards for the National Research Council, the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and he created and chaired the national panel that led to restructuring of the National Academy of Science and its National Research Council Board on Agriculture. He served as 72nd President of the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS) in 1981.

During a period of severe budget cuts, Weiser led an effort that resulted in the College of Agricultural Sciences and its 500 tenure track faculty members in 24 departments and research and extension centers across the state to view faculty scholarship as more than just published research results and to value and recognize faculty contributions to team efforts. He subsequently served on the Faculty Senate Committee that refined these concepts for the whole university. In 1995, OSU revised its promotion and tenure guidelines to reflect a larger vision of scholarship that permitted faculty members to do scholarship and document their scholarly achievements in teaching, advising, outreach, clinical work, performing arts, international or administrative assignments, as well as via traditional research and publications. Several other colleges and universities have used these concepts in considering and adopting similar changes.

Over his 33-year academic career, Weiser authored and co-authored about 180 publications. These publications were predominately in the areas of crop environmental stress physiology with emphasis on freezing injury and cold acclimation in plants, national science policy, interdisciplinary and regional coordination, college and university strategic plans, descriptive summaries of crop production and processing trends, and defining scholarship and describing it in several forms.

Weiser was born June 20, 1935 in Middlebury, Vermont, to Virgil Weiser and Ruth Haldorson. He grew up in Vermont, Virginia, Minnesota, North and South Dakota. In 1953, he married Jo Ann Tryznka (1935-1971), and they had four children: Russell, Jacqueline, Rachel, and Andrea. He married second, Adrienne Paulson (1938-) in 1972.

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Content Description

The Conrad J. “Bud” Weiser Papers relate to Weiser’s career at Oregon State University, service to the larger horticultural science profession, and broadening the concept of scholarship for faculty tenure and promotion. It includes articles, speeches, correspondence, course materials, workshop and conference material, among other items.

Weiser’s work at OSU can be found through course materials (specifically graduate-level Hort 520, research planning and organization) and articles he wrote based on his research. Additionally, there is material related to his work as head of the Horticulture Department and later as Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences.

Weiser participated in several professional organizations, including the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS), the National Academy of Agriculture, the National Academy of Agricultural Science, the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the United Oregon Horticulture Industry Advisory Board. He led the charge to recommend the founding of the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences under the National Academy of Sciences in the early 1980s. Files related to Weiser’s participation with these organizations are found throughout the collection.

During his tenure as Dean, Weiser led an effort within the College of Agricultural Sciences to view faculty scholarship as more than just published research results, and to value and recognize faculty contributions to team efforts. In 1995, this broadened definition of scholarship was adopted by OSU at large. With this success, Weiser wrote about faculty scholarship and spoke to several colleges, universities, and conferences about the work. Several files in the collection relate to faculty scholarship at OSU, defining the term more broadly, and presentations by Weiser on the subject.

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Use of the Collection

Preferred Citation

Conrad J. “Bud” Weiser Papers (MSS Weiser), Oregon State University Special Collections and Archives Research Center, Corvallis, Oregon.

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Administrative Information

Arrangement

The files are arranged alphabetically and then chronologically.

Acquisition Information

Donated by Conrad J. "Bud" Weiser, 2016.

Related Materials

Three oral history interviews with Bud Weiser are available in the History of Science Oral History Collection (OH 017). Additional materials pertaining to horticulture teaching and research are available in the Horticulture Department Records (RG 187), Horticulture Department Photographs (P 090), Oregon State Horticultural Society Records (RG 151), and the Oregon State Horticultural Society Photographs (P 054). The Special Collections and Archives Research Center holdings include the papers of several horticulture faculty: the James R. Baggett Papers (MSS Baggett), Arthur G.B. Bouquet Collection (MSS Bouquet), William A. Frazier Papers (MSS FrazierW), and the Melvin N. Westwood Papers (MSS Westwood).

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Detailed Description of the Collection

Names and SubjectsReturn to Top

Subject Terms

  • Crops--Oregon.
  • Horticulture--Oregon.
  • Horticulture--Study and teaching (Higher)--Oregon.
  • Learning and scholarship

Corporate Names

  • Oregon State University. Department of Horticulture

Finding Aid Authors: Ashley Williams Clawson.
2025

CC Attribution
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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