WHOLE VOL. APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY — HOWARD 55 



American vine into Europe as a root stock upon which to graft 

 the susceptible Vitis vinifera and brought about largely the solution 

 of the Phylloxera problem. 



The outbreak of the Rocky Mountain locust, threatening as it did 

 a number of the important grain-growing States, induced him to 

 make a serious effort to bring about national legislation, and he even- 

 tually succeeded in persuading Congress to appropriate a sum of 

 money and to establish what was known as the United States Ento- 

 mological Commission, of which he was made chief, the other 

 members being A. S. Packard, Jr.. and Cyrus Thomas. 



Aside from the appointment of an entomologist (Glover) in the 

 then insignificant Department of Agriculture at Washington, this 

 was the first Federal action that recognized in any broad way the 

 national importance of economic entomology ; and the credit for 

 this belongs surely to Riley. 



In June, 1878, he had become such a well known national figure 

 in entomology that he succeeded Townend Glover as Entomologist 

 to the United States Department of Agriculture, Glover's health hav- 

 ing failed. He remained in this post until March, 1879, when he 

 resigned and was succeeded for two years by Prof. J. H. Corn- 

 stock of Cornell. At the end of two years, Comstock returned to 

 Cornell University and Riley was reappointed Entomologist to the 

 Department. In the intervening years he had remained chief of the 

 United States Entomological Commission, with offtces at his private 

 residence in Washington. He remained as Chief of the Division of 

 Entomology until June, 1894, when he resigned. He died the fol- 

 lowing year as the result of a bicycle accident. 



Riley's work in the Department of Agriculture bore out his early 

 promise. He published many admirable reports and bulletins and 

 accomplished many excellent things. At the time of his retirement 

 he was probably the best known and surely one of the most highly 

 considered of the economic entomologists of the world. 



In looking over the whole field of Riley's life, he appears to me 

 as a very remarkable character, and I have made a rather careful 

 study of it from the beginning, since I was associated with him for 

 many years. I have not mentioned the fact that in 1868 he started, 

 in cooperation with Walsh, an entomological journal called The 

 American Entomologist. Walsh died before the second volume was 

 published. Of late I have been reading through these two volumes, 

 and I believe that few people have estimated the extraordinary influ- 

 ence that Walsh must have had over Riley in those early days. 

 Remember that Riley had no university training but that he had a 



