Last Work. I'inai. Honors 587 



Did on the potentiometer the last of the stem crown^alls on the Garden 

 sunflowers of the second plantin;;. They consistently have hail a hit^her 

 acidity (pH) and a s^reater total acid (I'liller scale reading) than any of 

 the normal parts of any atje; even the youngest. Tlie youngest part have 

 almost as little acidity as pure water, hi these particulars the sunflower is 

 unlike the sui;ar beet. That plant is more acid and the crownt^alls on it are 

 less acid than the tissues out of which they are developed whereas just the 

 reverse is the case in the sunflower, i. e. tumors more acid than the tissues 

 out of which they have developed. 



The following September, when Dr. and Mrs. Smith went to 

 Europe, he took with him his notes of that summer's potentiometer 

 crown gall studjes, and plann^ed to add these results to those 

 announced at the Buffalo meeting of the cancer research asso- 

 ciation. Some of the conclusions furnished a basis for addresses 

 given by him in Europe. Further, the prepared program of the 

 Association's eighteenth annual meeting, held in Washington 

 May 4, 1925, soon after his return, announced that he would 

 present a paper, "Additional notes on the pH of crown-gall 

 tumors." Evidently, however, regarding the new research matters 

 which he found while in Europe more important, he substituted 

 another address, " Some Newer Aspects of Cancer Research." 

 Medical men had confidence in him. In 1923, when Dr. Willy 

 Meyer, former president of the association's council, ^^ telegraphed 

 his congratulations because of Smith's election as vice president, 

 the latter wrote in his diary of Dr. Meyer: " He is a New York 

 surgeon greatly interested in some of my work. He perfected a 

 major operation for breast cancer. I saw him operated on for gall 

 stones by Dr. W. J. Mayo in 1913 at Rochester, Minnesota. He 

 said once in my Laboratory, ' Doctor, may you live a thousand 

 years! ' " Dr. Bloodgood once said ^^ of Smith to someone else, 

 " I have picked him to find the cause of cancer." Remember, 

 furthermore, that Smith had been elected president of the cancer 

 research association by a council composed of president William 

 Duane, secretary-treasurer W. H. Woglom, Dr. Robert B. Green- 

 ough, Dr. Meyer, Dr. Ewing, Dr. H. G. Wells, Dr. Frederick 

 Prime, and Dr. Francis Carter Wood. These men were all 

 medical doctors of the highest order. 



Dr. Smith appraised highly the value of pH, total-acid, and 



^^ four. Cancer Research 8: 137. 

 " Smith's diary, Dt-cember 8, 1922. 



