Missouri Botanical 
Garden Bulletin 
Vol. VII St. Louis, Mo., March, 1919 No. 3 
EARLY COLLECTIONS IN THE GARDEN 
HERBARIUM 
The oldest collection of plants in the herbarium of the 
Missouri Botanical Garden is one which was made about the 
middle of the eighteenth century and intended to illustrate 
a work! published in 1750. The specimens were collected 
in the vicinity of Leipzig, Germany, and have been carefully 
preserved in their original folders accompanied by their 
original labels; their condition at the present time in every 
way is quite as good as when first mounted, and, barrin 
untoward accidents such as fire or damage from natu 
causes over which man has no control, there is no reason 
why they should not serve indefinitely as a permanent con- 
erete record of the flora of central Europe. The collection 
is one of the few pre-Linnean herbaria, if not the only one, 
in America; and it has a historical as well as scientific in- 
terest. One of the specimens from this collection is shown 
in plate 8, and the label accompanying the specimen well 
exemplifies the method of designating the name of a plant 
previous to the introduction of the binomial in 1753. 
In founding the Missouri Botanical Garden, Mr. Shaw 
fully realized the advantages of library, economic museum, 
and laboratories in connection with the study of living 
lants. Accordingly, in 1857, he commissioned Dr. George 
ngelmann, who was in Europe at that time, to select such 
Backs as were most essential for this purpose and to arrange 
for the purchase of a large collection of dried plants which 
had been brought together during the latter part of the 
eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth century by 
Professor John Jacob Bernhardi in Erfurt, Germany. The 
selection of books was made and the Bernhardi herbarium 
purchased through the cordial coéperation of Dr. Engel- 
mann. Thus the library and herbarium of the Missouri 
Botanical Garden were started in the same year. 
2 Borumer, G. R. Flora Lipsiae indigena. 8vo. pp. 340. Leipzig. 
1750. 
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