Journal the New York Botanical Garden
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VOL. XXXII OCTOBER, 1931 No. 382 JOURNAL OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN PER AXEL RYDBERG JOHN HENDLEY BARNHART VEGETABLE DRUGS AND MEDICINES H. H. RUSBY THE BIG TREES OF CALIFORNIA ARTHUR HOLLICK SECTION OF "BIG TREE" ON EXHIBIT IN THE MUSEUM OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN E. D. MERRILL CONFERENCE NOTES FOR FEBRUARY AND MARCH POPULAR COURSES IN BOTANY AT THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN A GLANCE AT CURRENT LITERATURE CAROL H. WOODWARD NOTES, NEWS, AND COMMENT ACCESSIONS PUBLISHED FOR THE GARDEN AT LIME AND GREEN STREETS, LANCASTER, PA. THE SCIENCE PRESS PRINTING COMPANY Entered at the post-office in Lancaster, Pft., as second-class matter. Annual subscription $1.00 Single copies 10 cents Free to members of ihe Garden THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN BOARD OF MANAGERS HENRY W. DE FOREST, President CLARENCE LEWIS HENRY DE FOREST BALDWIN, Vice President ADOLPH LEWISOHN F. K. STURGIS, Vice President HENRY LOCKHART, JR. JOHN L. MERRILL, Treasurer D. T. MACDOUGAL E. D. MERRILL, Secretary KENNETH K. MACKENZIE RAYMOND F. BACON H. DE LA MONTAGNE, JR. CHARLES P. BERKEY J. PIERPONT MORGAN MARSTON T. BOGERT LEWIS RUTHERFURD MORRIS GEORGE S. BREWSTER H. HOBART PORTER N. L. BRITTON HENRY H. RUSBY NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER GEORGE J. RYAN THOMAS A. EDISON EDMUND W. SINNOTT CHILDS FRICK SAM F. TRELEASE R. A. HARPER WILLIAM H. WEBSTER JAMES J. WALKER, Mayor of the City of New York WALTER R. HERRICK, President of the Department of Parks SCIENTIFIC DIRECTORS R. A. HARPER, PH. D., SC. D., Chairman D. T. MACDOUGAL, PH. D., LL. D. RAYMOND F. BACON, PH. D., SC. D. HENRY H. RUSBY, M. D., SC. D. CHARLES P BERKEY, PH. D SC. D. GEORCE J. RYANJ LL. D. MARSTON T. BOGERT, SC. D., LL. D. _ ,,, ' _ NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER, PH. D, EDMUND W. SINNOTT, PH. D. LL. D., LITT. D. SAM F. TRELEASE, PH. D. DIRECTOR EMERITUS N. L. BRITTON, PH. D., SC. D., LL. D. GARDEN STAFF E. D. MERRILL, SC. D Director-in-Chief MARSHALL A. HOWE, PH. D., SC. D Assistant Director JOHN K. SMALL, PH. D., SC. D Head Curator of the Museums A. B. STOUT, PH. D Director of the Laboratories H. A. GLEASON, PH. D Curator FRED J. SEAVER, PH. D Curator ARTHUR HOLLICK, PH. D Paleobotanist BERNARD O. DODGE, PH. D Plant Pathologist FORMAN T. MCLEAN, M. F., PH. D Supervisor of Public Education JOHN HENDLEY BARNHART, A. M., M. D Bibliographer PERCY WILSON Associate Curator PALMYRE DE C MITCHELL Associate Curator SARAH H. HARLOW, A. M Librarian H. H. RUSBY, M. D Honorary Curator of the Economic Collections ELIZABETH G. BRITTON Honorary Curator of Mosses MARY E. EATON Artist ROBERT S. WILLIAMS Administrative Assistant E. J. ALEXANDER Assistant Curator ALBERT C. SMITH, A. B Assistant Curator CLYDE CHANDLER, A. M Technical Assistant MARJORIE E. SWIFT, A. M Assistant Pathologist ROSALIE WEIKERT Technical Assistant KENNETH R. BOYNTON, B. S Head Gardener G. L. WITTROCK, A. M Docent H. M. DENSLOW, A. M., D. D Honorary Custodian of Local Herbarium ROBERT HAGELSTEIN Honorary Curator of Myxomycetes E. B. SOUTHWICK, PH. D Custodian of Herbaceous Grounds ETHEL ANSON S. PECKHAM. Honorary Curator, Iris and Narcissus Collections JOHN R. BRINLEY, C. E Landscape Engineer WALTER S. GROESBECK Clerk and Accountant ARTHUR J. CORBETT Superintendent of Buildings and Grounds JOURNAL OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN PLATE 306 PER AXEL RYDBERG (July 6, 1860-July 25, 1931) JOURNAL OF The New York Botanical Garden VOL. XXXII OCTOBER, 1931 No. 382 PER AXEL RYDBERG (WITH PLATE 306) The New York Botanical Garden has recently been called upon to mourn the loss of one who devoted nearly a third of a century to continuous service on its scientific staff. Per Axel Rydberg, son of Adolf Fredrik Rydberg and Thekla Elfrida Otterstrom, his wife, was born in the farming community of Odh, in Molla parish, Vestergotland, Sweden, July 6, i860. While he was still a child, his father moved to Lofvene, in the vicinity of Lidkoping. He attended the royal gymnasium at Skara, graduating in 1881, and emigrated to America in the fol lowing year. Upon his arrival in the United States, he first sought and ob tained work in the iron mines of Michigan, but soon met with an accident so serious that for a time he was not expected to survive; its only permanent result, however, was a slight lameness that became more noticeable in his later years. It is quite possible that this accident, incapacitating him for manual labor and put ting an end to his ambition to become a mining engineer, had something to do with his return to those intellectual pursuits for which he had been fitted by his earlier training. From 1884 to 1890 he taught at Luther Academy, Wahoo, Ne braska, where he was in charge of the classes in mathematics. Feeling the need of a college education, he registered at the Uni versity of Nebraska, receiving the degree of B.S. in 1891. There is no doubt that it was the influence of that inspiring teacher, the late Charles Edwin Bessey, then professor of botany at the Uni versity of Nebraska, that determined his later lifelong devotion to the study of plants. It is true that young Rydberg had been interested in botany while still a student at Skara. He had then formed a represen- 229 230 tative herbarium of Swedish plants, and his first appearance in botanical literature was in the pages of the Swedish journal " Bo- taniska Notiser " in 1882, the year that he left his native country. But his herbarium, and with it his special interest in botany, had been left behind; and it was not until he entered the University of Nebraska, and found there a group of enthusiastic young bot anists gathered about their honored professor, that his early love of the science was rekindled, and he began to devote himself primarily to it. It was in the year of his graduation that a botanical survey of the state was undertaken by the Botanical Seminar of the univer sity. Six students or former students of the university, with the nominal advice but under the actual direction of Professor Bessey, constituted the survey. These were: Jared Gage Smith, now living in retirement in Hawaii; Thomas Herbert Marsland, who soon drifted away from active interest in botany; Roscoe Pound, now dean of the law school of Harvard University; Per Axel Rydberg; Albert Fred Woods, now director of scientific work of the United States Department of Agriculture; and Fred eric Edward Clements, now associate in ecology of the Carnegie Institution of Washington. The Botanical Survey of Nebraska published reports of its work, at first annually and then at longer intervals, and accumulated the materials for the flora of the state that was afterwards undertaken in the name of the Seminar. In the summer of 1891, Rydberg was commissioned by the United States Department of Agriculture to conduct botanical exploration in western Nebraska, and this was followed by similar commissions in succeeding years. In 1892 his field-work was in the Black Hills of South Dakota, and in 1893 among the sand hills of western Nebraska, especially in Thomas and Hooker counties. Meanwhile he had returned to Luther Academy, where he taught the natural sciences and mathematics from 1891 to 1893- In 1893 the Botanical Seminar of the University of Nebraska, to which he had returned for graduate study, announced a de tailed flora of the state, to be published in 25 parts; of these only three (numbers 1, 2, and 21) ever appeared, and part 21, com prising the Rosales, by P. A. Rydberg, was issued in 1895. This vear, 1895, was a very important one—perhaps the most impor- 231 tant—in his career. In that year he received the degree of M.A. from the University of Nebraska; the Rosales of the Flora of Ne braska and his Flora of the Sand Hills of Nebraska both bear that date; he spent the summer with Cornelius Lott Shear collect ing plants in Montana for the United States Department of Agri culture ; and at the end of the collecting trip he returned, not to Nebraska but to the vicinity of New York City, his home for the remaining half of his life. For most of the next four years he was professor of natural sciences and mathematics at Upsala College, Kenilworth, New Jersey, meanwhile registered as a candidate for the Ph.D. degree at Columbia University; he held a scholarship at Columbia in 1895-1896, and a fellowship in 1896-1897, and received his doc tor's degree in 1898. It was during this period that the writer of this sketch made his acquaintance. In the summer of 1896 he continued his field-work in Montana for the United States Department of Agriculture; in 1897 he was sent, with Ernst Athearn Bessey, by The New York Botanical Garden, to collect in Montana and the Yellowstone Park region; and in the summer of 1898 he was employed by the Garden while working up these collections. In 1897 a chapter of the honorary scientific fraternity Sigma Xi was established at the University of Nebraska, and in the fol lowing year Rydberg was elected a graduate member of this chapter. A few months after beginning his work at Columbia University, he was elected, January 14, 1896, to membership in the Torrey Botanical Club, the scientific society with which his work was ever after most closely associated. Early in 1899 the permanent staff of The New York Botanical Garden was first organized. Several of its members had been in the employ of the Garden for a year or two, but the first list of the staff as such seems to have appeared on the second cover-page of Bulletin no.