John D. Black

By modern standards a latecomer to the profession, Dr. Black was in his early thirties before he turned to the economics field. His contributions, however, reflected the richness of his undergraduate liberal arts education at the University of Wisconsin, which granted him his doctorate in agricultural economics in 1919 at the age of 36. He then served as a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Minnesota from 1918 to 1927 and, from 1921 to 1927, as chief of the division of agricultural economics. In his pioneering book Introduction to Production Economics, published in 1926, he anticipated many of the developments in general economic theories of production that were to become familiar ground for all economists to follow. In 1927, he joined the faculty at Harvard University and became increasingly involved in the arena of farm policy, serving as one of the authors of the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933.

Dr. Black served as president of the Farm Economic Association (1932) and AAEA (1955). He was named a fellow of the AAEA in 1957.