Feb. 23, 1905. 



THE AMERIC;*N BEE JOURNAL. 



137 



I napt J. F. HRtliRrlnntnn: m-umr. \mmim soldier I 



Written by P. H. ELWOOD, of New York. 



THE subject of this sketch would have gained distinction 

 in any occupation, for he was endowed by Nature with 

 boundless energy and indomitable will-power, coupled 

 with organizing and executive abilities such as would have 

 quickly placed him at the head in any large undertaking. 

 His power of comprehending the whole was no less remark- 

 able than his ability to grasp at the same time the minute 

 details of an extensive business. Had he at maturity en- 

 gaged in some extensive industrial operation, such as rail- 

 road construction, mining, or manufacturing, undoubtedly 

 success would quickly have been his with its attendant 

 wealth ; but long before this, while yet in his teens, circum- 

 stances and inclination led him into a new and untrodden 

 field — that of making bee-culture a specialty — a separate 

 and successful branch of agriculture. 



At this early date there were no bee-books nor bee- 

 papers ; no movable-comb hives, no honey extractors, no 

 bee-smokers, no comb foundation — nothing in fact to war- 

 rant the average bee-keeper to believe that bee-culture could 

 be made a separate and independent business. Yet Capt. 

 Hetherington believed it could be done, and made it a spe- 

 cialty from the beginning, being first, I think, to depend 

 entirely upon the sale of honey and wax for his livelihood, 

 and the maintenance and upbuilding of the business. 



His intimate friend and co-laborer, Moses Quinby, 

 always regarded him as the ablest exponent of modern bee- 

 culture, and as pre-eminently the one to demonstrate to the 

 world that bee-keeping as a business could be made as uni- 

 formly successful as any other branch of agriculture. How 

 well he has done this a faithful history of his life should 

 recite, but no one can tell of the time and energy, and 

 money, spent in reaching this result, nor can any one ever 

 fully know of the discouragements that befell him before 

 his efforts were crowned with success. 



John Edwin Hetherington was born in Cherry Valley, 

 N. Y., Jan. 7, 1840, and died in the same place Dec. 31, 1903. 

 He came of a good ancestry, his father being an educated 

 English gentleman ; his mother a member of the old Judd 

 family of Connecticut. The father dying when the young- 

 est of the three brothers was less than a year old. Master 

 John less than three, the entire care and training of the 

 three children fell upon the mother, and the highest tribute 

 we can pay her is to point to the characters developed in 

 her sons. All three were in the military service during the 

 war for the preservation of the Union, and they came out 

 as they went in, with spotless reputations and characters, 

 and abstainers from the use of tobacco and strong drink — 

 gentlemen in thought, word, and deed. 



Capt. Hetherington bought his first colony of bees when 

 12 years old, with money earned for that purpose. The 

 thorough-going business methods of the mature bee-keeper 



Capt. Hetherlngton's First Load of Bees. 



were foreshadowed in the care taken in bringing home thi, 

 first colony. The old family horse is put before the larj.' ■ 

 spring wagon, and is driven by a member of the family. 

 For the additional comfort and security of the colony u: 



bees, the hive is suspended in a sheet, the ends of which are 

 tied over a springing pole, while the ends of the pole rest 

 on the shoulders of the two older brothers, who sit facing 

 each other, as shown in the engraving. This extra care 

 seemed necessary for the colony that was destined to con- 

 tribute so much toward bringing apiculture from the dark- 



Capt. Hetherington's Home, with Last Load 

 of 32 Colonies of Bees. 



ness of superstition into the full light of modern science. 

 In contrast to this is given a picture of one of the later loads 

 of 32 colonies. On one side is seen the family residence, 

 while on the other side is the first honey-house and shop, 

 with the barn in the rear. At the back of the well-kept 

 lawn are a couple of wintering-cellars, one of which is 

 shown in another engraving. The bee-yards, spring and 

 fall, are near the cellars, and cover acres of ground. For 

 some years back no bees have been kept at home during the 

 summer months, thus avoiding all annoyances to neighbors. 



The boy bee-keeper had good success, and within five 

 years he had marketed honey by the ton, and had secured 

 an average of nearly 60 pounds of honey in glass boxes 

 from his entire apiary. He was a close observer and quick 

 to adopt improvements. Before he had been in the business 

 a half-dozen years he had perfected a double-walled hive 

 with a chamber of confined air between, and had applied 

 for a patent on the same. On thorough trial he discovered 

 that while warmer for a while this double-wall prevented 

 the sun from drying out the moisture, and the hive soon be- 

 came damp and consequently cold. He made 600 of these, 

 and mechanically they were probably as perfect as hives 

 can be made. Not finding the double-wall satisfactory he 

 next put his bees into straw hives, the last of which were 

 made to take the Quinby size of the Langstroth frame. 

 This was about the time of the commencement of the Civil 

 War. The box straw-hives were excellent for winter and 

 spring, and better suited to the requirements of the bees at 

 other times than the hives previously used. They were not 

 of the usual straw-hive shape, but had flat tops as shovn in 

 the picture, and were well adapted to boxing. They cost 

 nearly $2.00 apiece, and at one time he had about 1400 of 

 them. 



With the immovable-comb straw-hive he adopted a sys- 

 tem of artificial swarming by driving that was so success- 

 ful that often he had not a single natural swarm from an 

 entire apiary. 



Previous to this he had in use swarm-catchers for issu- 

 ing swarms. These were placed before the old colonies and 

 held the clustered swarms until the apiarist could get 

 around to hive them. 



After a trial of the movable frame the Captain found 

 he could not do without it, but in his trial he made the im- 

 portant discovery that the colonies in the straw-hives with 



