Florida and California Laboratories 247 



the state experiment stations confined their work to state boun- 

 daries less and less and collaborated in more than one plant disease 

 research. This was noticeable in the work of Halsted who, invited 

 to Mississippi, published at the agricultural college and experi- 

 ment station there his important bulletin 19 (1892) on tomato 

 and melon blight. In August 1891 he had read before Section F 

 a paper on a disease of melon, squash, and cucumber, believed 

 caused by bacteria, and a notice of this was published in the 

 Botanical Gazette.^^ 



Smith, during the years 189*^-1896, would re-study this work 

 for reasons to be explained more fully in Chapter VII. Suffice 

 it to say now that, not\vithstanding the excellent work of Waite, 

 plant bacteriology had not gained a strong foothold in the Division 

 of Vegetable Pathology. As late as March, 1893, Galloway told 

 Burrill that they had " very few^ specimens of bacterial plant 

 diseases on hand . . . pear blight, olive tuberculosis and perhaps 

 one or two other things." 



In January 1893 Pammel published in the Botanical Gazette 

 what Smith later characterized as the "' first important paper " ^* 

 on the bacteriosis of rutabaga. This malady, in time, became 

 known as the "' Black Rot of Crucifers." The causal organism was 

 not named by Pammel Bacillus campestris until the year 1895 

 when he issued as part of bulletin 27 from the Iowa experiment 

 station a further consideration of this disease which, with 

 Pammel's knowledge and approval, other plant pathologists, 

 including Smith and Russell, restudied. 



Whether workers in all quarters realized it or not, plant bac- 

 teriology as an exact laboratory science, requiring the services of 

 a leading American specialist and authority, was widening in 

 scope each year. In the September 10, 1890 issue of Journal of 

 Mycology ^^ Galloway and Miss Southworth had presented 

 " Preliminar}' Notes on a New Destructive Oat Disease," possibly 

 attributable to bacteria, and in August 1891, before Section F of 

 the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Gallo- 

 way read a paper which incorporated " Further observations on a 



" 16: 257-258, Sept. 15, 1891. 



^^Introduction to bacterial diseases of plants, op. cit., 159. 



^''6(2): 72-73; also Botanical Gazette 16(9): 257, Sept. 15, 1891. Report of the 

 Chief of the Division of Vegetable Pathology, for 1891: 361. 



