The Borlaug Blog

Throughout my time as a docent, I have discovered that much of the Hall of Laureates can relate to my own 50-year career as a nurse. As my friends will attest to, I nurse everyone. There have been some wonderful blogs written by my fellow docents that highlight the art and culture of the Hall of Laureates; however, I find that my perspective is unique. As I guide our visitors through the magnificent rooms in the Hall of Laureates, I find ways to view the legacy of the Laureates through my own lens - as a nurse.

As we enter the Ruan Laureates Room and look towards the ceiling, we notice names in the squinches (or the space that fills the upper corner of the room to form a dome-shaped area). These names identify important figures in the history of agriculture — people who would have won the World Food Prize if it had existed during their lives. Two names that I discuss relate specifically to nutrition and health. Nicolas Appert was a Frenchman who in 1811 developed a method to preserve and transport bread to Napoleon’s army by putting it in airtight cans and then boiling the cans. Hippocrates is the father of medicine, but he is here because he believed, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” In modern days we have found this to be true, as this quote was the theme for the 2016 Borlaug Dialogue, where Laureates Maria Andrade, Jan Low, Robert Mwanga and Howarth Bouis were honored for their biofortification of staple crops with essential vitamins and minerals, helping reduce “hidden hunger” and improving nutrition worldwide.

In the Laureate alcove, we see likenesses of all the Laureates. All of them have been awarded the “Nobel Prize for Agriculture” because of their tireless work and dedication to alleviate hunger and improve nutrition worldwide. In 2000, Dr. Surinder Vasal and Dr. Evangelina Villegas won the World Food Prize for their development of Quality Protein Maize, a more productive and nutritious strain of maize which improved millions of people's diets. The 1990 recipient John Niederhauser (USA) solved a long-time problem of late potato blight that had caused the Irish potato famine in the 1840s. The 2018 recipients, Dr. Lawrence Haddad and Dr. David Nabarro, have concentrated their career on improving nutrition for mothers and children.

One of the areas of food and agriculture for which the World Food Prize is awarded is Nutrition/Health.  This is displayed in the Borlaug Ballroom in the inscription on one of the ten ornamental bowls. In the Borlaug Ballroom, as I share the story of the great Dr. Norman Borlaug, I mention how he needed to keep producing new strains of wheat. The pest “rust” would mutate and then again be able to destroy wheat fields, similar to bacteria mutations that require pharmaceutical companies to continue developing stronger antibiotics to treat diseases in humans.  

In the Iowa gallery, the Gandhi-Carver Diptych painting by Mary Kline-Misol shows how Gandhi wrote letters and sought advice from Iowa State University graduate George Washington Carver regarding increasing protein in his vegetarian diet and demonstrates how important nutrition is worldwide. Herbert Hoover’s Feeding Europe painting by Peter Thompson shows how Hoover spearheaded the feeding of hundreds of millions of hungry people during and after both World Wars.

On the garden level, two major events on the History of Agriculture timeline caught my nursing eye. In 1897, Dutch scientist Christian Eijkman discovered how to prevent beriberi: by adding fish, meat and vegetables containing thiamine to the diet. In 1912, Casimir Funk discovered an array of essential vitamins and nutrients and their role in disease prevention.

I could give many more examples of how the Hall of Laureates inspires me as a nurse. As a docent I have given tours to many different people. Each has his or her own lens through which they see and interpret art and culture, whether they are a scientist, an engineer, a farmer, a woodworker, an artist, an educator or a student. They see their own personal meanings in the vast display of artwork and information. I learn from each one by how they view the World Food Prize Hall of Laureates, and it is a privilege for me to be a docent.