138 



THE AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



Feb. 23. 19f5. 



the Lanpstroth frames did not winter or build up in the 

 spring: nearly so well as did the others whose combs were 

 built against the sides of the hives, leaving no spaces at 

 the ends of the combs. He therefore adopted the newly- 

 invented Quinby hive, after materially assisting in perfect- 

 ing the closed-end frames of the same. And after an ex- 

 perience of many years with both open and closed-end 

 frames, he repeatedly assured me that he decidedly pre- 

 ferred the Quinby frame to anything else. 



A part of his Virginia bees were put in the Van Deusen 

 metal-cornered self-spacing frames, but those he cared for 

 himself were kept in his own frames. 



No new invention ever entered the apicultural world 

 but that Capt. Hetherington noted it, and, if valuable, he 

 adopted it. The honey-extractor was his as soon as it 

 crossed the Ocean, and he used it ever after, believing it to 

 be one of the greatest inventions and one of the most useful 

 articles in the apiary. 



He very hopefully followed up the invention of comb 

 foundation from the beginning, and experimented with it 

 four or five years after the date of Wagner's patent, obtain- 

 ing his samples from a Mr. Steel, of New Jersey. The in- 

 vention came from Germany, as perhaps did also the sam- 

 ples. It was only a midrib without any attempt at cell- 

 walls, and was a failure, but lacked only Yankee ingenuity 

 to make it a success by giving it side-walls. He was quite 

 enthusiastic at the time of receiving the first handsome 



Two of Capt. Hetherington's original straw-hives over 40 years old. 



Wall about 3 inches thick. One at the right is the Langstroth 



movable-comb, while the other has no frames. 



sample from the Weiss machine, but, alas 1 he did not then 

 know that it was made of paraffin, nor did he at first ob- 

 serve that the cells were intermediate in size between 

 worker and drone. The queen was slow to use this size cell 

 except when the foundation was convex or stretched so that 

 the cells were enlarged, when she very freely deposited 

 drone-eggs in them. Noticing this fact, he saw the neces- 

 sity of making and keeping the cells of proper size. To 

 prevent sagging he tried cloth, paper and wood centers, all 

 of which were objectionable. 



Finally, in 1876, he incorporated fine wires into the wax 

 sheet from which the foundation was made, and met with 

 complete success. Several years before this Mr. Quinby 

 and himself had made a complete comb of very thin tin 

 coated with wax. This was tested in midwinter, Capt. 

 Hetherington bringing bees into a warm room for the pur- 

 pose, and although the cell-bottoms were flat, it was freely 

 used for rearing brood and storing honey. 



In the manufacture of comb foundation it was found 

 that impressing the rhomboidal bases upon the wax sheet 

 would lay bare the wires unless a wasteful quantity of wax 

 was used. To avoid this he left the cell-bottom flat as in 

 the tin comb, thus also economizing in wax and simplifying 

 its manufacture. 



Previous to the invention of flat-bottomed foundation 

 he had persistently refused to use natural-base foundation 

 in his honey-boxes, as he was unable to make or buy any 

 that would not leave an objectionable fishbone in the honey, 

 and he did not wish to sell to others what he would not use 

 on his own table, or what would injure the high reputation 



his honey had gained. With flat-bottomed foundation 12 to- 

 14 feet to the pound, he was able to produce comb honey 

 that, on the average, had a more delicate center than that 

 built wholly by the bees. 



In 1888, Mr. Cowan, president of the British Bee-Keep- 

 ers' Association, and the most illustrious scientific exponent 

 of bee-culture in Great Britain, searched in vain for foun- 

 dation or fishbone in Capt. Hetherington's honey. The 

 next day he visited a neighboring bee-keeper and found the 

 objectionable hard center in his honey, although he had 

 used no thicker natural-base foundation than 10j< feet to 

 the pound. Certain it is, that until the advent of the so- 

 called " new process " Weed foundation, the flat-bottomed 

 had no rival in the production of fancy comb honey. Capt. 

 Hetherington's patent covers all kinds of wire supports for 

 foundation, whether imbedded in the foundation as made 

 or consisting of supporting wires in wired frames to which 

 the foundation is later attached in various ways, and he 

 should be recognized by the bee-keeping fraternity as the 

 inventor of all wire-supported foundation. This is one of 

 the greatest inventions of modern apiculture. Without it 

 we could hardly use comb foundation in the brood-chamber, 

 or newly-built comb in the extractor. And the flat-bot- 

 tom wired foundation as used by Capt. Hetherington is prob- 

 ably also the cheapest way in which to use such supports. 

 It substitutes machine- work, which is cheap, for hand-work 

 which is costly and scarce. It saves wax, because being 

 better supported it can be made lighter. It saves- 

 brood, since by the usual method of attachment there are 

 hundreds of cells in every hive crossed by bare wires, and 

 other hundreds or thousands of cells so stretched because of 

 insufficient support that the queen does not use them for 

 brood-rearing. The loss yearly from this cause may 

 amount to enough to buy wired foundation. Capt. Hether- 

 ington was a skilled mechanic, and until within a few years 

 ago made all of his own supplies, including hives, sections, 

 packing-cases, honey-extractors, box-making machines, 

 etc. Even the three dozen whefslbarrows used in his out- 

 yards were made by himself. The material was usually 

 prepared ready to put together at a mill five miles from 

 home. To this mill he went daily with his men, arriving at 

 daybreak and returning after dark. This, kept up for 

 weeks in the cold winter weather, was indeed a strenuous 

 life, and told heavily on a constitution impaired by army 

 life and disease ; but so energetic was he that he would 

 have continued it longer had not the importunities of fam- 

 ily and friends prevailed. 



His hives, sections, cases, etc., were models of perfec- 

 tion and neatness. His packing-cases were of the whitest 

 basswood he could find in the forest, papered inside, with the 

 sections resting on cross-cleats — the style now so widely 

 advertised as the " no-drip " shipping-case. The editor of 

 Gleanings, in an appreciative article, gives him credit of 

 being not only the originator of this, but also of the tall 

 section and super-spring for holding them in place. He was 

 among the very first to adopt the section-box, and his first 

 were made to contain a comb taller than the brood, and the 

 sections were held in place by the flat super-spring now 

 coming into general use. 



In 1874 he made a shipment of comb honey to Great 

 Britain, being the first sent abroad in quantity. At the 

 Centennial in 1876 his exhibit of 3500 pounds of honey in 

 single-comb sections, together with a variety of ornamental 

 packages of honey and wax, was admired by all visitors. 

 The exhibit was built up to represent the turreted front of 

 an old castle, so arranged as to permit the light to pass 

 through in the freest manner, the whole surmounted by the 

 flag under which he fought for three long years. The 

 highest award was given him — a medal and diploma. A 

 like award was given him at the Columbian Exposition at 

 Chicago in 1893. The wording of this diploma by his friend 

 Secor — " For great skill in the apiarian art, and taste in 

 preparing its products for the market, this exhibit is ex- 

 ceptionally complete in every particular " — was very grati- 

 fying to Capt. H. 



He also received an award on comb honey at the Pan- 

 American Exposition at Buffalo. 



For many years past Capt. Hetherington has been rec- 

 ognized as the most extensive bee-keeper in this country. 

 Sixteen years ago Mr. Cowan, editor of the British Bee 

 Journal, after traveling through nearly all bee-keeping 

 countries, wrote that at Cherry Valley, N. Y., he " met the 

 most extensive bee-keeper in the world ". That year his 

 colonies numbered 3000, located in 22 out-yards, from 2 to 

 12 miles from home. The fall of 1903 he went into winter 

 with 2200 colonies, 600 of which were placed in the cellar in 

 one day. 



