FOREIGN PLANT 
INTRODUCTION MEDAL’ 
Memorial to the late Frank N. Meyer presented to Mr. Barbour Lathrop “for dis- 
tinguished service in the field of Foreign Plant Introduction” 
Davip FAIRCHILD 
President of the American Genetic Association 
RANK N. MEYER, Agricultural 
F Explorer of the Office of Foreign 
Seed and Plant Introduction, who 
lost his life in the waters of the 
Yangtze River, left a bequest of a 
thousand dollars which was to be used 
by the staff of that office to defray 
the expenses of an outing or to be 
equally divided among them. This was 
Mr. Meyer’s touching tribute to the 
organization with which he was con- 
nected for thirteen years as its agricul- 
tural explorer in China, Turkestan 
and other parts of Asia. 
Rather than use the fund thus left 
by Mr. Meyer for the purpose which 
he designated in his will, the individuals 
of the Office preferred to put the 
bequest into a permanent tribute to 
his memory in the shape of a medal 
which should be awarded for distinctive 
service in the field of foreign plant 
introduction. This has been done, 
and the awarding of it one or more 
times a year it is hoped will not only 
do honor to those who deserve recog- 
nition for their servicesin this im- 
portant field of research, but will 
arouse a wider and keener interest in 
what is surely one of the most im- 
portant fields now open for young 
scientific men—that of the introduction 
into this country of new food and 
otherwise useful plants. 
The medal, designed by the well known 
sculptor, Theodore Spicer-Simson, who 
designed the service medal given to 
Herbert Hoover by the National Acad- 
emy of Sciences, has on one side of it 
a facsimile of the bas-relief which 
Queen Hatshepsut of the 18th Dynasty 
(1570 B. C.) had executed upon the 
wall of her palace at Thebes, to com- 
memorate the first introduction of 
a foreign plant—the incense tree from 
the land of Punt. This is the first 
recorded monument we have to the 
work of Foreign Plant Introduction. 
On the reverse side of the medal is the 
name of Frank N. Meyer, for thirteen 
years Agricultural Explorer of the Office 
of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction 
through whose bequest the medal is 
made possible. The Chinese inscrip- 
tion is from a poem by Chi K’ang, a 
poet of the Tang Dynasty, 618 A. D., 
which, freely translated, carries the 
thought that, ‘‘In the glorious luxuri- 
ance of the hundred plants he takes 
delight.’”’ To the right of this inscrip- 
tion is a fruiting branch of the Chinese 
tsao or jujube (Ziziphus qujuba), the 
cultivated forms of which constitute 
one of Mr. Meyer’s contributions to 
the economic horticulture of America; 
1 The first of the Frank N. Meyer memorial medals for distinctive work in the field of plant 
introduction, which the associates of Mr. Meyer have had struck in his memory, was presented 
in the presence of the staff of the Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction and invited 
guests to Mr. Barbour Lathrop of San Francisco on the 3rd day of May, 1920, in the Homer 
Building, Washington, DAC: 
The associates of Mr. Meyer selected the American Genetic Association as the organization 
through which this mzmorial medal shall henceforth be awarded. The address of presentation 
by the President of the Association is printed in full as it gives the details regarding the meda 
and a brief account of the plant hunting expeditions of Mr. Lathrop whose work has contributed 
largely to the supply of plant species with which the plant breeders of America are now working 
in the production of superior forms of food and ornamental or other useful plants——EpITor. 
169 
