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COLLEGE BOTANY COULD COME 



ALIVE 



Hiden T. Cox and John A. Behnke 



The mid-century Earth visitor from outer space finds science and technology 

 booming. The Botanical Society of America is thriving. But botanical educa- 

 tion is in a sad plight. Botany has been "inadvertently" omitted from biology 

 curricula; many botany departments have suffered attrition or amputation; 

 enrollments have dwindled until we have teachers to burn; even the subject 

 matter is being raided by microbiologists taking over mycology and groups 

 breaking away to form independent fields, e.g., bacteriology and many fields 

 of agriculture. 



Who is to blame for these mid-century doldrums? Administrators? Per- 

 haps in part. Zoologists? Only if pride and aggressiveness regarding the im- 

 portance of their field is blameworthy. Chemists? True, they have made hay 

 by taking on plant tissues and organic compounds and have emphasized 

 hxochemistry instead of biochemistry, but — . Botanists? Guilty and charged 

 with the major responsibility. They have been at times meek and aloof, at 

 times bullheaded and uncooperative. They have lacked pride in their pro- 

 fession; they have accepted too readily the "sissy" label for their work. With 

 the world inescapably dependent on their plants and looking ahead to a 

 photosynthesis-energy era, they have sought to hide plants with strange 

 labels and in newly created categories. Their success in making the study 

 of plants virtually unintelligible to the layman would almost seem to be by 

 design prompted by some strange idea that by multiplying baffling terminology, 

 botany would gain intellectual stature. 



How did this all come about? Must it be so? What can be done about it? 

 Let's take a quick look at what has happened during these five decades, and 

 then set up a few Mt. Everests for botanists to climb in the years ahead. 

 It would be folly to try to chart the specific trails in detail. That must be 

 done as we go. But at least we should have some idea of where we want to 

 get. 



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