Earl O. Heady

Dr. Heady's contributions to the profession and to Iowa State University are most obviously evidenced by Heady Hall, the building that now bears his name and houses the economics faculty at Iowa State. Dr. Heady first came to Iowa State as an instructor in 1940, after earning his undergraduate and master's degrees in economics from the University of Nebraska. He earned his Ph.D. from Iowa State in 1945 and became a full professor in 1949. He remained at Iowa State until his retirement in 1983. In 1957 Dr. Heady was named director of the Center for Agricultural Adjustment at Iowa State, which has become the Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD). Dr. Heady served as director of CARD until 1983, and under his guidance CARD became a premier economic research institute with an emphasis on the economics of agricultural production, resource use, and development. President Lyndon Johnson appointed Dr. Heady to the White House Committee on Domestic Affairs in 1964 to provide insight on agricultural development issues.

Dr. Heady was named a fellow of the AAEA in 1963. He received the American Farm Economic Association's award for outstanding published research three times and the "better books award" for his book, Linear Programming Methods, in 1958. He served as vice-president of the American Farm Economic Association in 1954. He was the first American elected to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and also was given honorary membership to the Royal Swedish Academy of Agricultural and Forestry Sciences and the Soviet Academy of Agricultural Sciences. He received honorary doctorates from four different universities, including the University of Nebraska. His honors from Iowa State include the first Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor in Agriculture (1956) and the first Henry A. Wallace Award for Distinguished Service to Agriculture (1978).