Choosing NC State

Governor James Baxter Hunt, Jr. discusses why he chose to attend NC State, as well as his decision to change his major.

Interview on 2012-05-29 00:00:00 -0400

Transcript

00:00:00.000 Well I decided to go to NC State
00:00:05.888 primarily because of
00:00:10.039 my background in agriculture.
00:00:14.678 I first planned to
00:00:20.336 major in dairy husbandry.
00:00:25.018 I'd grown up with a little small dairy,
00:00:27.820 we milked about fifteen, twenty cows each day,
00:00:31.521 and I thought, well, I'll be a dairy farmer.
00:00:36.383 So I intended to get my degree in dairy husbandry
00:00:46.279 and I stayed in that for a couple years,
00:00:50.425 took some of those tough courses in chemistry,
00:00:55.452 and then I saw another tough chemistry course coming up.
00:01:02.417 ....trying to remember which one it was...
00:01:05.240 ...but it was reputed to be the toughest course in the college
00:01:10.258 and I didn't much want to take it.
00:01:13.780 But that wasn't the main reason I changed my major.
00:01:17.871 I changed my major because I decided
00:01:21.306 that becoming an agriculture teacher was something I might rather do,
00:01:26.625 and we had a department of education that offered a degree in agricultural education,
00:01:33.024 leading to becoming a vocational agriculture teacher or to other things you could do.
00:01:37.618 So I switched my major and majored in agricultural education
00:01:46.600 and of course later on I got a master's degree in agricultural economics
00:01:50.681 and my master's thesis was judged one of the three best in America
00:01:55.314 by the American Farm Economic Association.
00:01:58.306 But I went to NC State, I guess, because I
00:02:05.006 identified with the agricultural economy and the farm people
00:02:09.447 and I wanted to try to make things better for them.