[1] Jenkins oversaw the writing of hundreds of agricultural publications during his tenure, specializing in the culture, cure, and fermentation of tobacco.

He pursued graduate studies at Yale's Sheffield Scientific School under the tutelage of noted agricultural chemist Samuel William Johnson.

From 1875 to 1876, Jenkins studied in Germany at Leipzig University and then at the Royal Saxon Academy of Agriculture and Forestry in Tharandt, Saxony under Friedrich Nobbe.

Johnson was the Station's director, while Jenkins and future Storrs Agricultural School principal Henry P. Armsby were his assistants.

Jenkins rapidly developed a reputation for both scientific excellence and ability to convince skeptical farmers to adopt new agricultural techniques.

[3][5] Dedicated in October 1932 at a ceremony presided over by Governor Wilbur Cross, the Jenkins Laboratory of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station was named in his honor.