University of Wyoming
Gerald (Jerry) Nielsen was a soil scientist on the University of Wyoming’s Afghanistan Team from 1963-1966 and a professor in the College of Agriculture at Montana State University. He earned his B.S. in agriculture and education, an M.S. in soil science, and a Ph.D. in soil science with plant ecology from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. In 1963 Nielsen and his wife LaVonne went to Afghanistan as part of the University of Wyoming USAID contract team to conduct soil and crop research at the Afghanistan Ministry of Agriculture and teach at Kabul University in Kabul, Afghanistan. After returning from Afghanistan, Nielsen became a professor at Montana State University where he conducted research and taught until retirement in 1999.
Collection contains 35mm slides of Afghanistan regarding Gerald Nielsen’s experiences as a soil scientist on the University of Wyoming USAID contract team from 1963-1966, master scans and metadata spreadsheets of the digitized slides, oral histories with Gerald and LaVonne Nielsen, correspondence, reports, and publications regarding the Nielsen’s experiences on the team and in Afghanistan.
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There are no known other archival collections created by Gerald A. Nielsen at the date of processing.
This material was received from Barbara Baxter Jenkins and Gerald A. Nielsen from 2018-2023.
The collection was processed by Jamie J. Greene in December 2018 and updated in December 2019, September 2022, and June 2025.
Item Description, Box Number, Folder Number, Collection Name, Collection Number, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.