The Poisoning of Count Achilles De Vecchj and the Origins of American
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Volume 16, Number 1, Spring 2006 37 Th e Poisoning of Count Achilles de Vecchj and the Origins of American Amateur Mycology David W. Rose President, Connecticut-Westchester Mycological Association (COMA) [email protected] Abstract Th e fatal mushroom poisoning of Count Achilles de Vecchj, an Italian diplomat residing in Washington, DC, in 1897 was widely reported in the press and served as a stimulus to promote knowledge of mush- room identifi cation. Count de Vecchj died from eating Amanita muscaria, a toxic species not normally fatal. Subsequent investigation of the de Vecchj poisoning by botanists of the United States Department of Agriculture resulted in public advisories about toxic mushrooms and edible species sold in public markets in Washington, DC. Th e poisoning occurred at a time of increasing popular interest in mush- room identifi cation and mycophagy, and mushroom clubs in the northeastern United States took great interest in the case to educate the public about mushrooms. Keywords: Amanita muscaria, amateur mycology, Charles Horton Peck, Charles McIlvaine, Count Achilles de Vecchj, mycophagy IN 1897, AT THE K Street Market in Wash- believing they were eating Amanita caesarea. ington, DC, a person could purchase fresh wild What they ate was actually Amanita muscaria. Dr. mushrooms from several African-American mar- Kelly lapsed into a stupor, was hospitalized, and ket women. Th e women collected these fungi in survived; Count de Vecchj, a portly man whose nearby fi elds and woods and routinely off ered health was compromised by several chronic prob- them for sale along with other vegetable produce lems, fell into a coma and died the following day. available at the market. Th ey were noted for Th e fatal poisoning was widely reported in the wisely limiting their selection to four common press, sending a shockwave of concern through edi bles, and authorities from the U.S. Depart- the mycological community of Washington and ment of Agriculture confi rmed the expertise of the northeast coast, especially since the Count’s the market women in identifying and keeping to reputation as member of the Italian Diplomatic these species. Corps and legendary leader of a United States Th e unfortunate occasion that gave rise to this Civil War brigade heightened the sense of no- confi rmation was the unusual purchase of a poi- toriety and misfortune of the misidentifi cation. sonous species from a man not normally known In fact, the de Vecchj poisoning represents a sig- as a mushroom vendor at the K Street market. ni fi cant moment in the growing popularity of Th e purchaser, Achilles de Vecchj, a well-known mushrooming in the 1890s, and the case became Washingtonian who was reportedly “an expert instructive as a cautionary tale of what could hap- in mushrooms” instructed the market man to pen to a mushroom fancier whose attention to col lect the mushrooms for him and purchased a detailed identifi cation proved too cavalier. basketful to enjoy at the table. On the morning of American culture in the 1890s involved an November 9, 1897, Count de Vecchj sat down to expanding middle class and the growth of many breakfast with his friend Dr. Daniel J. Kelly; the popular sporting activities with enduring sig- two men consumed platefuls of the mushrooms, nifi cance, like baseball and cycling. Among the McIlvainea 16 (1) Spring 2006 37 38 McIlvainea leisure activities of the time was a burgeoning Columbus Horticultural Society Journal, and Popu- interest in mushrooms. Mushrooming as a hobby lar Science Monthly. Endorsing wild mushrooms near the turn of the century sometimes arose at as a standard item of cuisine still met with general the converging pursuits of botany and horticul- resistance save for those individuals stimulated by ture, as the work of mushroom cultivator William a curiosity for the natural world and a propensity Falconer suggests, and sometimes stood alone, to utilize “nature’s bounty.” As the unwary and isolated from mainstream amateur botany as a uninformed began to notice and eat mushrooms, peculiarity fi t only for alienated individuals like and perhaps be poisoned by a toxic variety, the artist Mary Banning, taunted and teased by street need for basic instruction in identifi cation be- urchins for her interest in the fungi. William came paramount. Publications on identifying ed- Dean Howells neatly captured the ambivalence ible and poisonous species became more frequent of the growing fascination with mushrooms used in the 1890s; the fi rst mushroom clubs were orga- for nature study in a middle-class Boston fam- nized in Washington, Boston, and Philadelphia; ily in his novel Th e Rise of Silas Lapham (1885). and several individuals stepped forward to edu- Howells wrote: “Lily, the elder of the girls, had cate the masses about the pleasures and dangers brought back a number of studies of kelp and of fungi. Th ese included Thomas Taylor, Charles toadstools, with accessory rocks and rotten logs, Horton Peck, William Hamilton Gibson, Julius which she would never fi nish up and never show A. Palmer, and Charles McIlvaine. any one, knowing the slightness of their merit.” Th omas Taylor (1820–1910) was the fi rst to Interest in mycophagy grew steadily from the disseminate critical information about mush- time of the Civil War. Popular articles with titles rooms to a broad audience in the latter part of the such as “A Basketful of Fungi,” “Mushrooms for 19th century. Th e U.S. Department of Agricul- the Table,” and “French Mushrooms” appearing ture (USDA) hired Taylor as its microscopist in in the periodicals American Kitchen Magazine, the 1871, when the department had but a single mi- Volume 16, Number 1, Spring 2006 39 croscope for the study of the fungal origin of plant the course of his lifelong career at the New York diseases and the adulteration of foods. Besides his State Museum he identifi ed, named, and illus- professional studies and published reports on trated over 2,700 species of fungi and published grape mildews like Botrytis and Oidium, Taylor scores of articles describing them in botanical reserved a passion for the gilled mushrooms. His journals and popular magazines. Th ough he fo- annual U.S.D.A. Report of the Microscopist led to cused on the fl eshy fungi (mushrooms), Peck also a serial publication entitled Student’s Handbook studied plant pathogens and in the 1890s shifted of Mushrooms of America Edible and Poisonous his focus to edible and poisonous mushrooms in (1897–98), stemming from his enormously pop- an eff ort to educate a public that was increasingly ular “Twelve Edible Mushrooms of the U.S.” in interested in mycophagy. His Report of the State the U.S.D.A. annual report of 1885. In 1894 and Botanist on Edible Fungi of New York, 1895–1899 1895, the USDA mailed out over 36,000 copies (1900) culminated this aspect of his work. In of this report, attesting to the phenomenal public 1893 he organized a prize-winning exhibit of interest in mushrooms. Th ese reports, along with edible and poisonous mushrooms for the World’s Charles Peck’s annual reports in New York, were Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois. the fi rst publications that served a growing con- As Peck’s reputation developed, a great di- stituency hungry for detailed knowledge about versity of individuals wrote to him seeking his the identifi cation of fungi. Taylor and Peck, of determinations for their specimens and copies course, were correspondents for over two decades of his published reports, and he happily served from 1874 on matters mycological. Peck provid- the amateur mycological community of the time. ed assistance with the identifi cation of specimens, Several expressed not only an interest in identify- placed Taylor in contact with Mary Banning for ing and eating mushrooms, but in promoting this mushroom sketches, and also corresponded with interest to feed the impoverished and unfortu- his daughter A. Robena Taylor, who assisted in nate, based on the perception that mushrooms as Taylor’s mushroom studies. For Th omas and a food source were generally abundant but going Robena Taylor, as for many others, Peck was a to waste through ignorance and disuse. One of touchstone and powerful magnet for mycologi- these was Charles McIlvaine (1840–1909) whose cal inquiry; his singular expertise and generous personal mission was “to popularize knowledge of outreach were unsurpassed in developing general fungi and have the vast supply of useful food now interest in the fungi. wasted, utilized.” McIlvaine became a regular Charles Horton Peck (1833–1917) was an correspondent, fi rst writing to Peck in 1893 with authority on the fungi and an internationally this challenging introduction as a mushroom en- known fi gure in the botanical community in the thusiast: “I take no man’s word for the qualities late 19th century. Appointed the fi rst New York of a toadstool. I go for it myself.”¹ His voracious State Botanist by the Board of Regents of the appetite for suspicious toadstools included such State University of New York in 1867, Peck species as Russula emetica (“among the best”) and forged a unique career in mycology and botany, Boletus satanus (“one of the very best”). McIl- assiduously collecting and cataloguing the fungi, vaine earned an enduring reputation as a bold mosses, and vascular plants of New York and experimenter and for his nonchalance in tossing identifying specimens from around the world off extravagant claims for the edibility of toxic for a host of correspondents in the United States species of Hypholoma and unpalatable species of and Europe. Th ough he restricted his eldworkfi Cortinarius. Th ese claims seem scarcely credible to New York, his mycological exploration of today, and no one having an acquaintance with the state was extensive, and his work was very common mushrooms would recommend eating, well known through the publication of annual for example, the poisonous Hypholoma fasciculare, reports of the New York State Museum.