MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 103 
in the Union Army; he served throughout the remainder of 
the war and received an honorable discharge with the title 
of captain of volunteers. 
In 1869 Mr. Letterman settled at Allenton, Missouri, 
where he soon became teacher in the public school and held 
this position for about twenty years. He then served for two 
years as superintendent of schools for St. Louis County and 
subsequently resumed teaching in his adopted town. 
Letterman’s interest in botany seems to have been incited 
by Mr. August Fendler, the well-known Venezuelan col- 
lector, whom he met soon after going to Allenton. From 
1870 to a few months prior to his death, or for approxi- 
mately forty years, Letterman continued an active interest 
in science, and, arin. his extreme generosity in the dis- 
tribution of plants collected and ample notes concerning 
them, he made, by correspondence, many friends both at 
home and abroad. 
Through Prof. Charles Sprague Sargent, Mr. Letterman 
became a collaborator in the preparation of the noted Jesup 
collection of North American woods, now in the American 
Museum of Natural History in New York City. 
Letterman was never married, and his extremely retiring 
nature led him to live a very modest and isolated life. He 
apparenely had no desire to achieve a reputation through 
publication, even to recording the results of his own observa- 
tions; but his greatest pleasure was in imparting information 
to his pupils, and a wing afield the flora and fauna of the 
beautiful country in which he lived—the wooded hills and 
valley of the Meramec river. 
To botanists Letterman was known as a keen and dis- 
criminating collector, particularly of Missouri plants, but 
to the people of his own immediate community, on whom 
he has left a lasting impression, he will long be remembered 
as an elevating friend and inspiring teacher. 
NOTES. 
On May 30, Dr. J. M. Greenman, Curator of the Her- 
barium, attended the funeral of the late George W. Letter- 
man, at Allenton, Missouri. 
The wives and daughters of the delegates to the Milliners’ 
Convention visited the Garden on June 24. They mani- 
fested especial interest in the orchids, as these seemed to 
suggest ideas for hat decorations. 
