(Revised information from Guide to the Lazslo Valko Papers 1936-1974, Cage 470)
Dr. Laszlo Valko (1907-1982) served as a Professor of Agricultural Economics at Washington State University from 1950 to 1972. Valko was born on June 18, 1907 in Budapest, Hungary. He earned doctoral degrees in law, political science, and economics at Budapest University. After completing his education in 1938, he entered government service, and directed the official social work in Hungarian agriculture until 1944. Valko left civil service and joined the Hungarian Resistance when Nazi Germany invaded and occupied Hungary in 1944. Following World War II, Valko was appointed to lead the Office of Social Administration in Hungary's Ministry of Social Welfare, but stepped down as Soviet influence spread throughout the country in late 1945. In 1946, he served as the director for the Central Institute of Farmers' Co-operatives, and also taught at the University of Szeged. In 1848, after the Hungarian Communist Party took control of Hungary's co-operatives, Valko and his wife, Helena, escaped to Switzerland. They immigrated to the United States a year later.
After a brief tenure at Iowa State University, Valko joined the Washington State University faculty in 1950, and remained a member of the Agricultural Economics Department at WSU until his retirement in 1972. Widely published, translated, and traveled, Valko represented the United States at many co-operative farming conferences worldwide throughout the 1950s and 1960s. After his retirement from WSU, he frequently delivered guest lectures at the invitation of numerous foreign governments.
This collection contains papers of Dr. Laszlo Valko (1907-1982), a Professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Washington State University. The collection primarily consists of materials related to Valko's research on farming cooperatives in the United States and Europe, including conference programs, loose articles, journals, newspaper clippings, and books. The collection also contains copies of award certificates, correspondence including letters to members of the U.S. Congress and to the Assistant to the Vice President, as well as personal writings about research related travels.
Preliminary Inventory List:
Box 1 - Programs, loose articles, and journals, correspondence including letters to Congress and to the Assistant to the Vice President, copies of award certificates, personal writing about travels, newspaper clippings about conferences and international meetings, and papers relating to research on farming cooperatives in the United States, 1859-1981
Box 2 – Books and copies of books on farming cooperatives (some authored by Valko).
This is an unprocessed collection. Any arrangement reflects either a pre-existing order from the records' creators or previous custodians, or preliminary sorting performed by staff.
This collection is open and available for research use.
Copyright restrictions may apply.
[Item description]
Preliminary Guide to the Laszlo Valko Papers, 1959-1982 (MS.1982.44)
Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State University Libraries, Pullman, WA.
Transferred to Washington State University Libraries from the Department of Agricultural Economics in 1982 (MS.1982.44).
Laszlo Valko Papers 1936-1974, Cage 470
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the online catalog. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.