BOTANY AT ST. LOUIS 251 



thirty miles west of St. Louis. Here Mr. Letterman taught in the public 

 schools uninterruptedly for twenty years, and then for two years served a3 

 superintendent of schools in St, Louis County. Shortly after settling in Allen- 

 ton Mr. Letterman met August Fendler, the botanist, who had a farm at this 

 time in the neighborhood. This meeting with Fendler stimulated his interest 

 in plants, especially in trees, and led to an acquaintance with Dr. Engelmann, 

 for whom Letterman made large collections of plants in the neighborhood of 

 Allenton, with many notes on the oaks and hickories. In 1880 he was appointed 

 a special agent of the Census Department of the United States, to collect infor- 

 mation about the trees and forests of Missouri, Arkansas, western Louisiana 

 and eastern Texas, and later he was employed as an agent of the American 

 Museum of Natural History in New York, to collect specimens of the trees of 

 the same region for the Jesup collection of North American woods. The dis- 

 tribution of the trees of this region before Mr. Letterman's travels was little 

 known, and much useful information concerning them was first gathered by 

 him. Of his numerous discoveries species of Vernonia, Poa and Stipa commem- 

 orate the name of Letterman. 



The above account is taken verbatim from Sargent's " Silva of 

 North America," as it is the only authentic account of Mr. Letterman's 

 life available. Mr. Letterman still lives at Allenton, Missouri, and is 

 carrying on his botanical work. From the accounts of those in a posi- 

 tion to know, his herbarium is very large, and at the present time prob- 

 ably contains as complete a representation of the St. Louis flora as any 

 other, with the possible exception of the Eggert collection, which, 

 however, can hardly surpass it. Mr. Letterman is connected with the 

 local botanical societies, and is well known by the botanical workers 

 of the city. 



One man who has left an enduring impression upon botany, al- 

 though his life work was along other lines, was Dr. Charles Valentine 

 Eiley.^^ Dr. Riley was born at Chelsea, London, September 18, 1843. 

 His boyhood was spent at Walton-on-Thames, where he became ac- 

 quainted with W. C. Hewitson, the author of a work on butterflies. 

 This acquaintance undoubtedly turned his inclinations towards ento- 

 mology. He studied for three years in the school at Dieppe and after- 

 wards at Bonn. His teacher at the latter place urged him to study art 

 at Paris, but this was not done. At the age of seventeen he emigrated 

 to Illinois and when about twenty-one went to Chicago as reporter and 

 editor for the Prairie Farmer. He was for six months in an Illinois 

 regiment during the latter part of the Eebellion. He attained such 

 success as an entomologist that he was made State Entomologist for 

 Missouri in 1868, and he held this office until 1877, when he went to 

 Washington in the government service. 'During this period he and his 

 assistants. Miss Mary E. Murtfeldt and Mr. Otto Lugger, worked out 

 two cases of the relation of insects to plants which are of more than 

 ordinary interest. 



In 1863 there were first noted in France the ravages of the Ameri- 



^ Howard, L. 0., Proc. Soc. Prom. Agric. Sci., 17: 108-112, 1896. 



