Odomtologica II (3): 245-249 September I, 1982

OBITUARY

Charles+Francis Byers

A short biography ofC.F. BYERS (bom Nov. 18,1902, Johnstown,Pennsylvania,

USA; deceased Oct. 27, 1981, Williston, Florida, USA; educator and entomologist)

is followed by a list of his odonatological publications (1925-1981).

On October 27, 1981, Professor C. F. Byers

died at a nursing home in Williston, a small town

near Gainesville, Florida after a prolonged

illness. Dr CHARLES FRANCIS BYERS was

born in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, November 18,

1902, and attended school there through high

school, where he graduated in 1921. He then went

to the University of Michigan where he received

the A.B., M.S., and lastly the Ph.D. in 1929.

Along the way he studied fora semester in 1924 at

the University of Florida and for the school year

1926-1927 at Cornell University where he did

some work with Prof. James G. Needham in the

Entomology Department. He attended summer

schools at the Marine Biological Stationin Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and the

University of Michigan Biological Station at Douglas Lake.

It was while at Cornell that he contributed to the completion of the 1929

'Handbook of the of North America’ by J.G. Needham and H.B.

Heywood. In the preface we read, 'Miss Elsie Broughton helped with the

completion of both drawings and manuscript; and most of the drawings of

were made Mr C. Francis genitalia by Byers. Whole sections of the text were

written the last named.’ Indeed find by two we that the name of C. Francis Byers sections heads the on Argia, and Ischnura, while Elsie Broughton's with name appears Aeshna and the Somatochlora.

From Cornell University Dr Byers moved to the University of Florida in the fall of 1927 as Assistant Professor of Biology, where he continued his study of the

Odonata. He took leave in a the year 1928-1929 to return to Michigan to 246 M.J. Westfall

complete his Ph.D. with a thesis on the of Florida. He continued his research and publishing on the Odonata untiladministrativedutiesoverwhelmed him. In 1947 when I finished my Ph.D. at CornellUniversity, also working with

Prof. Needham, Dr Byers hired me as an assistant professor of Biology with the intent that I would do the work on the OdonataofFlorida which he had dropped.

He was thenHead Professor ofBiological Science, laterbecoming acting Deanof the Graduate School (1951-1952), and then Assistant Dean in charge of Gra- duate Programs of the College of Arts

& Sciences until he left the University of

Florida in 1959. After this hetaught at the

University of Idaho (1959-1960), while at the same time serving as a consultant for the Biological Science Curriculum Study,

Boulder Colorado, sponsored by the

American Institute of Biological Sciences and the National Science Foundation.At

Elimira College in New York he was

Professor of Biology 1960-1968, and chairman of the Division of Natural

Sciences 1960-1966. He was also Deanof the Faculty 1963-1968, as well as Acting

President January-May 1964. He then taught 1968-1969 at Ripon College in

Wisconsin, and finally at Rollings College in Winter Park, Florida before returning to Gainesville in retirement. During his teaching years he taught courses in

General Biology or Zoology, Invertebrate Fig. 2. Dr C.F. Byers, replying to the toast at Zoology, Parasitology, Evolution, Gene- the banquet of the Fourth International tics, and Geography Geology. Symposium of Odonatology, Gainesville,

Many honors were awarded to Dr Florida, August 4, 1977. (Photo: R.

Byers, including a Fulbright Fellowship Rudolph). to India in 1957-1958, where he taught

courses in Evolution and Genetics at Banaras HinduUniversity. While at Cornell

University he held the Heckscher Fellowship, and at the University of Michigan the Carl Braun Fellowship. From the Florida Academy of Science he received a

deliberationof research award and medal. He was asked to participate in the a Education Board in committee on Graduate Studies of the Southern Regional

American Council 1950, and the studies on general education of the on

Education in East Lansing, Michigan 1950-1953. He attended the Harvard

Institute for College and University Administrators in 1965. C. Francis Byers 247

Dr officer in Phi Byers was a member and many honorary societies, including Sigma, Sigma Xi, Gamma Alpha, Delta Sigma Phi, and Beta, Beta, Beta. His professional society memberships included the American Association for the

Advancement of Science (Fellow), American Association of University

Professors (president, Florida chapter 1936-38, 1946-48), Entomological Society of America (Fellow), Florida Academy of Science (charter member), Florida

Entomological Society (president 1930-31), Association of Southeastern

Biologists, and the Athenaeum Club of Florida (president 1931). He is listed in

American Men of Science’, ‘Who’s Who in America’, and ‘Presidentsand Deans of American Colleges and Universities’.

Dr Byers was a co-author of a widely used textbook of general biology and contributed to the development of a number of curricula in general biology, including the Biological Science Curriculum Study (B.S.C.S.). This study resulted in recommendations for major reorganization and revitalization of the

curriculum for which biology secondary and high schools subsequently were adopted nationally, and today this work provides the basis for the biological sciences curriculum taught by many public and private secondary schools.

1 never went on a collecting trip with Dr Byers, but he and fellowentomologists in the Biology Department inspired me and my students to take many trips to

Florida northwest (known as the panhandle of the state), where we discovered new of Odonata for Florida species the list with almost every expedition. Dr

and his had favorite Byers colleagues a collecting area in Liberty County, ‘Camp

This for Torreya’. area was very productive us. We laterextended our collecting to the tip of the panhandle. It was my pleasure to describe Telebasis byersi in

1957, with types from Gainesville. When I told him that I was going to name it in his honor 1 thought that his 1934b paper gave the first reference to the genus in

Florida, but later I learned that E.B. and J.H. Williamson in 1930wrote that they had taken a Telebasis of doubtful species at Palmdale, Florida.

the last of did in Apparently collecting Odonata which Dr Byers was the summer of 1949 when he had a fellowship at the Mountain Lake Biological

Research Station in Virginia. When he returned he asked me to identify the specimens for him, and he then wrote a short paper on them, his last publication on the Odonata, except for the nice review he wrote in 1955for the ‘Manualofthe

Dragonflies of North America’ by Needham and myself. When he left the

U of his Collection niversity Florida, was given to the U niversity and is now a part of the Florida State Collection of in Gainesville. His library and odonate sold correspondence were to the Laboratory of Aquatic Entomology at

Florida A & M University in Tallahassee.

1977 In when we hosted the Fourth InternationalSymposium of Odonatology in Gainesville I invited Dr and Mrs Byers to be our guests at the banquet. I the purchased publisher’s remainder of his 1930 ‘Contribution to the Knowledge of Florida Odonata’ and he autographed copies bought by members at the 248 M.J. Westfall

banquet. In a short speech he remarked that he had never expected to see so many times people at one time who were interested in dragonflies. I saw him only a few

from then until his death. His widow, Jeanette, and daughter, SarahFrances, are

continuing to live at the family home in Gainesville.

NEW ODONATA TAXA DESCRIBED BY DR C.F. BYERS

Coenagrionidae

Enallagma culicinorum 1927b dorsopallidus 1934a

= E. anna Williamson 1900 Progomphus alachuensis 1939

Enallagma weewa I927e

ODONATOLOGICAL BIBLIOGRAPHY OF DR C.F. BYERS

(1925-1981)

1925 Odonata collected in Cheboygan and Emmet Counties, Michigan. Pap. Mich. Acad. Set 5:

389-398.

1927a An annotated list of the Odonata of Michigan. Occ. Pap. Mas. Zool.. Univ. Mich. 183:1-16.

1927b the North Key to American species of Enallagma with a description of a new species

(Odonata: Zygoptera) Trans. Am. enl. Soc. 53: 249-260.

1927c Notes on some American nymphs (Odonata. Anisoptera). JlN. Y. enl. Soc. 35:65-

75,

I927d The nymph of Libellula incesta and a key for the separation of the known nymphs of the

Libellula genus (Odonata). Enl. News 38: 113-115.

I927e Enallagma and Telagrion from western Florida, with a description of a new species. Ann.

ent.enl. Soc. Am. 20: 385-392.

I927f Automobile collecting. Enl. News 38: 319.

1928a Comments on the Odonata recorded in ‘A List of the of New York’. Enl. News 39:

229-230.

1928b Florida dragonflies captured by the automobile. Enl. News 39: 236-239.

1928c The unknown nymphs of North American Odonata. Can. Enl. 60: 4-6.

A 1929 [Sections on Argia, Enallagma, and Ischnura]. In: J.G. Needham & H.B. Heywood,

handbook of the dragonflies of North America, pp, 284-302, 311-342, 342-357. Thomas,

Springfield-Baltimore.

1930 A contribution to the knowledge ofFlorida Odonata. Univ. Fla Pub!, biol. Set Ser. KD: I-

327.

1931a Florida dragonflies. Fla Nat. 4(2): 25-30.

1931b Dixie dragonflies collected during the summer of 1930 (Odonata). Em. News 42: 113-119.

1932 Dragonfly narratives in fact and fiction. Fla Nal. 5(2-3): 21-24.

1934a Progomphus dorsopallidus, a new species from Venezuela (Odonata-Gomphinae). Occ.

Pap. Mus. Zool. Univ. Mich. 294: 1-5.

1934b Record of Florida dragonflies - I. Enl. News 45: 214-216.

with the 1936a The immature form of Brachymesia gravida, notes on the of group

(Odonata: Libellulidae). Enl. News 47: 35-37. 60-64.

1936b Records of Florida dragonflies - 11. Fla Enl. 19: 40-42.

A review of the of the Neurocordulia and Pubis 1937 dragonflies genera Platycordulia, Mist:

Mus. Zool. Univ. Mich. 36; 1-36.

1938 Some dragonflies from the Florida Keys (Odonata). Enl. News 49: 163-165. C. Francis Byers 249

A the the with 1939 study of dragonflies of genus Progomphus (Gomphoides) a description ofa

Proc. new species. Fla Acad. Sci. 4: 19-85.

Notes the 1941 on emergence and life history of the dragonfly Pantala flavescens. Proc. Fla

Acad. Sci. 5: 14-25.

1951 Some notes on the Odonata fauna of Mountain Lake, Virginia. Em. News 62: 164-167.

1955 (Review): Dragonflies of North America, by James G. Needham and Minier J. Westfall, Jr.,

1955. Fla Em. 38: 34-38.

1980 Portrait onp. 245 dated M.J. Westfall Jr.

Department of Zoology

University of Florida

Gainesville, Florida 32611, United States