10 A CENTURY OF PROGRESS IN THE NATURAL SCIENCES 



Committee. But what may have been Dr. Randall's natural history interest I do 

 not know. Nor do I know the interests of Dr. Charles Farris, who attended the 

 first and third meetings of the Academy but left the state in the summer of 1853 

 and was lost track of. The other three physicians were well known citizens of 

 the city and left distinguished records. The youngest of the three when the 

 Academy was founded was Dr. Trask, twenty-nine, then Dr. Kellogg, forty, and 

 Dr. Gibbons, forty-one. 



John Boardman Trask came to California overland with John W. Audubon, 

 as related before this, and his interests seem to have been perhaps the broadest 

 of any of the seven founders. It was doubtless to Dr. Trask that each of the 

 Academy members turned for that sympathetic interest in the individual special 

 studies that so often isolate members of a scientific society. Perhaps Trask's 

 particular interest was that of the potential use of native plants for medicinal 

 purposes. E. E. C. Stearns, who knew him as a close friend, spoke of Trask's 

 "genial qualities, untiring energy and all-around ability" and said that he was 

 "the leader, closely followed by Dr. Albert Kellogg." Complementing the gentle- 

 ness of Kellogg, Trask's calm assurance in the face of difficulties must have been 

 a staying power in the survival of the Academy during its insecure years. John 

 Xantus, when in San Francisco on his way to Lower California for birds for 

 Baird and plants for Gray, wrote to Baird at Washington that "Dr. Trask is 

 particularly kind to me, and so is Dr. Ayres, who both told me to consider their 

 houses as my own, and command their services no matter how." 



Dr. Henry Gibbons, the first of four generations of physicians, was particu- 

 larly interested in meteorology and kept weather records of such accuracy that 

 the Smithsonian Institution was happy to publish them. 



Naturalists in California After 1853 



Born in New Hartford, Connecticut, educated in medicine at Charleston, 

 South Carolina, and Transylvania College, Lexington, Kentucky, Albert Kellogg 

 came to California in 1849 and evidently first engaged in business. He had 

 practiced in the South but those who knew him say he was never known to 

 request a payment. Never blessed with a strong constitution, Dr. Kellogg re- 

 turned to his New England home and soon joined a party bound for California 

 by way of the Horn. He arrived at Sacramento on August 8, 1849. The plant 

 collections he had made along the west coast of South America at ports of call 

 were destroyed in a flood at Sacramento soon after his arrival. He was associated 

 in Sacramento with the Connecticut Mining and Trading Company, but removed 

 to San Francisco about the year of the Academy's founding and established a 

 pharmacy business there with some medical practice on the side. He entered into 

 the spirit of the Academy from its very inception, and seems to have especially 

 stimulated the members and visitors to the city to communicate specimens to the 

 Academy for study and identification. One of the most prominent of these par- 

 ticipants was Dr. John A. Veatch, of whom we shall have more to tell directly. 

 Dr. Kellogg's personal botanizing began in earnest in the summer of 1867 when 

 he accompanied Professor George Davidson of the United States Coast Survey 

 and W. G. W. Harford to Alaska. Several hundred species were collected in 

 triplicate, one specimen going to the National Herbarium at Washington, one to 



