ACADEMY OF NATURAL SCIENCE OF ST. LOUIS. 637 



1809 Dr. Engelmaim advised giving up or selling their share in 

 the lot and purchasing the Mary Institute — the female branch of the 

 Washington University — for the purposes of the academy. Twenty- 

 five thousand dollars would buy the building, of which five thousand 

 was already promised; twenty-five thousand dollars more would be 

 needed for equipment. In 1882, when the society had reached the 

 age of twenty-five years, it was still without a home; it had just 

 moved, however, into the Washington University, where it had a, 

 meeting room and space for its small museum and library free of 

 rent. In 1893 the plan for building was revived, but failed, and 

 to-day (1897), when forty-one years have passed, the society is still 

 homeless. Its interest in the Lucas lot was long since converted into 

 cash, and forms part of its present fund. The Historical Society 

 has become the owner of a well-located building, and the academy 

 occupies quarters at present in it. A meeting room is situated on 

 the ground floor; it is supplied with oil portraits of the presidents 

 and prominent past members of the academy. In upper rooms, not 

 particularly easy of access and not at all adapted to their use, are a 

 reading room and the library. Here, too, is stored away the supply 

 of Transactions held for distribution. No attempt has been made 

 for some years to secure museum collections, and what few specimens 

 the academy owns are either stored away or displayed in some other 

 institution. 



Although the publication of the Transactions had at one time 

 been almost discontinued, three volumes had appeared, crowded with 

 important papers. The appearance of the fourth volume is con- 

 nected with one of the most serious blows received by the academy. 

 This volume was published by Dr. George J. Engelmann as a me- 

 morial volume to his father. George Engelmann, who had been 

 with the academy from its start, one of the founders of the old West- 

 ern Academy in 1836, died in February, 1884. 



George Engelmann is a name which will live long in the annals 

 of American science. A native of Germany, he was born at Frank- 

 fort-on-the-Main, February 2, 1809, and was the oldest of a family 

 of thirteen children. In 1827 he held a scholarship at Heidelberg; 

 in 1830 he was at the University of Berlin, and in 1831 he gradu- 

 ated, an M. D., at Wiirzburg. His dissertation was upon Plant 

 Teratology; it possessed unusual merit, and attracted wide attention 

 among the masters in the subject. In 1832 he was at Paris for medi- 

 cal study, but in the fall of that year sailed for this country to serve 

 as agent for friends looking to investment in America. At that time 

 the Mississippi Valley was truly frontier. Dr. Engelmann tarried 

 for a time in Illinois, then traveled in Arkansas and adjacent dis- 

 tricts, but finally, in 1835, settled at St. Louis to practice medicine 



