American Crystal Sugar Company: Sugar Beet Research Files (S5037)

1930-

HISTORICAL SKETCH

This collection consists of research publications, reports and photographs, and supplements the record of the Red River Valley Sugar Beet Growers Association (S4868).  Prior to the acquisition of the American Crystal Sugar Company in the 1970s, by growers in Minnesota and North Dakota, the company maintained an agricultural research facility in Colorado.  Records from this facility were moved to offices in the company headquarters in Moorhead, Minnesota after the growers purchased the company.  These records constituted a library for ongoing research in sugar beet cultivation.  The records were donated to the Northwest Minnesota Historical Center in 1999. 

COLLECTION DESCRIPTION
The collection consists of numerous research publications concerning sugar beet cultivation, which were organized in the Colorado research facility and numbered, 1 through 1318, at some point in the 1950s.  The remainder of the collection consists of several hundred photographs of sugar beet fields, test plots, beet equipment, research slides, and plant operations in various parts of the upper Midwest and western United States.  In addition, there is a set of charts that show the extent of sugar beet acreage in various parts of the American Crystal company’s growing areas, plus newsletters.  Most materials are in good condition, although some of the glass plate negatives of photographs are deteriorated. 

Inventory

Boxes 1-4

Pamphlets/Books - Numbers 1 through 1318

            - Miscellaneous, not numbered

Crystal Ag Notes (Newsletter).  1991-96

Box 5

Photographs - California

- Casselton

- Chaska

- Clarksburg

- Crookston

- East Grand Forks

- Equipment

- Field

- Miscellaneous

- Plant

- Equipment

- Field

            - Dated. 1930-60s

            - Not Dated

- Graph

- Greenhouse

- Idaho

- Machinery

- Mason City

- Miscellaneous

- Moorhead

- Equipment

- Field

- Misc.

- Plant

- Negatives

- New Mexico

- Nielsville

- Obihiro, Hokkaido

- Phoenix

            - People

                        - Identified

- Unidentified

- Plant

- Red River Valley

            - Research

- Seed

- Rocky Ford

- Equipment

- Field

- Plant*

- Research/Miscellaneous*

- Ruthruff

- Salem

            - Utah

- Waseca

Progress Reports -170 through 389

            - Miscellaneous

Publications

Reports, Miscellaneous

Retirements

Slides - Field

- Miscellaneous

- Research

Box 6

Charts

*Glass plate negative available

NOTE:  See also S4868 for further materials concerning American Crystal Sugar Company.