Otto F. Hunziker papers

Otto Frederick Hunziker was born in Zurich, Switzerland on December 25, 1873. He graduated from an agricultural college at age 19, and subsequently moved to America and worked at a farm near Attleboro, Massachusetts. In 1895, he enrolled in a one year college at Providence, Rhode Island to improve his English language skills and gain business training. He returned to Switzerland for some time after graduating in 1896.

Hunziker returned to America to enroll at Cornell University at age 25. He graduated with honors after two years in 1900, and received his Masters of Science degree one year after that in 1901. He served as assistant in charge of Dairy Bacteriology for one year at Cornell while completing his master’s degree. After leaving Cornell, Hunziker took a position operating a research laboratory at a condensed milk plant in Ellicottville, New York. It was here that he met Florence Bell Burne, whom he married in 1905. Together they had three sons and three daughters.

In 1905 Hunziker accepted a position at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, as Instructor in Dairying, as well as working at the Agricultural Experiment Station in Dairy Husbandry. Hunziker was made Associate Professor of Dairying in 1906, and later Professor of Dairying (1907) and Professor of Dairy Husbandry (1909). In 1909, the Board of Trustees named Hunziker the first Chief of the Dairy Husbandry Department. While at Purdue, Hunziker planned Smith Hall which was built in 1913, and included an annex for a Purdue University Creamery.

After retiring from Purdue in 1917, Hunziker accepted a position as manager of the manufacturing department of Blue Valley Creamery, which was headquartered in Chicago. Hunziker established a research program and laboratory for various creameries in this position. After 1939, Hunziker continued to serve the industry as a dairy consultant, lecturer, author, and publisher.

Hunziker’s contributions to the dairy field include the standardization of Babcock glassware, understanding of the effect of metals on quality of milk products, research about butter quality and storage, and determination of the cause of mottles and fishy flavor in butter. He developed new and efficient methods of processing cream and for churning butter, and he received patents for several methods of deodorizing cream. He published two books--The Butter Industry (originally published in 1920, revised in 1927 and 1940) and Condensed Milk and Milk Powder (originally published in 1914, revised in 1918, 1920, and 1926)—as well as over 50 bulletins, leaflets, and scientific articles.

A charter member of the American Dairy Science Association (A.D.S.A.), Hunziker also served as its third president from 1910-1912. He received numerous honors and awards including: a diploma from the Italian government for a scientific presentation at the International Exposition at Milan; honors from the Australian dairy Council in 1927; an honorary Doctorate of Science from Purdue in 1932; a Distinguished Service Scroll from the A.D.S.A. in 1934; an honorary diploma from the Brazilian Institute of Industrial Technology in 1942; and an honorary membership in the “Sociedad Espanola de Bromatologia” from Spain in 1950. He also served as official delegate to six International Dairy Congresses in 1911, 1928, 1931, 1937, 1949, and 1953. He was also chosen as one of the ten Master Minds in Dairy in 1930 when two farm journal editors were prompted to make an exhaustive survey to determine which pioneers had made the most significant contributions to the dairy field. The list of ten dairy pioneers included Babcock, Hoard, Eckles, DeLaval, McCollum, Pasteur, Hacker, Borden, Henry, and Hunziker.

Hunziker died on November 16, 1959.