1508 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Dec. 1 



DEATH OF DR. JOHN DZIERZON. 

 His Place in Apicultural History. 



BY W. K. MORRISON. 



We have to chronicle the death, on the 

 *26th of October, of the Rev. John Dzierzon, 

 D. D., Father Emeritvis in the Catholic 

 ■Church, at his home in Lowkowitz, a ham- 

 let near Kreutzburg, Silesia, Prussia. He 

 was born in the same place, Jan. 11, 1811, 

 probably in the same house in which he died, 

 so that, had he lived a few weeks more, he 

 would have celebrated his 96th birthday, or 



REV. JOHN DZIERZON. 



—From OravenhorsVs Practical Bee-keeper. 



35 years over the allotted threescore and 

 ten. He was born just i7 days after L. L. 

 Langstroth, the father and founder of Amer- 

 ican bee-keeping. In many ways these men 

 greatly resembled each other. Both lived to 

 a good old age — the one 8.5 and the other 95; 

 both were clergymen, typical of their coun- 

 try, and both were founders of a great school 

 of bee-keeping, and both died in October, 

 after long and useful lives. Though Father 

 Dzierzon spent his whole life in the same lit- 

 tle hamlet, he was not without honor in his 

 own country. He was of Polish exti'action, 

 .and lived only a short distance from the 



Polish line. We hear much nowadays about 

 environment and heredity, and believers in 

 both will find that Dr. Dzierzon's life bears 

 testimony to the value of both, for the Poles 

 are great bee-keepers, and, owing largely to 

 the presence of large amounts of linden 

 (basswood), that part of Europe is a great 

 bee country, although the subject of our 

 sketch had to depend very largely on the 

 blue corn-flower ( Centurea cyanus) and 

 buckwheat for almost all his surplus honey. 

 The Poles are a gifted race. 



In his early years young Dzierzon must 

 have been greatly impressed with the hor- 

 rors of war, for he lived in a region deci- 

 mated by Napoleon in his 

 great campaign against 

 Russia. It hardly seems 

 possible that one man's life 

 would connect us with the 

 great battles of Friedland, 

 Eylau, and Borodino; but 

 hei'e we have to do with a 

 great bee-keeper who could 

 do it, and who died only 

 1 ast month. But the people 

 were sick of glory and car- 

 nage, and devoted them- 

 selves with great industry 

 for many years to the arts 

 of peace. Dzierzon chose 

 the peaceful vocation of 

 pastor of a church in Karls- 

 markt, a nearby town, and, 

 as a pastime, to the art of 

 l)ee-keeping, and in due 

 season became the chiefest 

 of bee-keepers in the two 

 great empires of Germany 

 and Austria-Hungary. 



Some too enthusiastic fol- 

 lowers have claimed for Dr. 

 Dzierzon honors which he 

 himself never laid claim to 

 — the invention of mova- 

 ble frames. In his "Ra- 

 tional Bee-keeping," pub- 

 lished in 1878, he strongly 

 approves frames and fix- 

 tures far inferior to those 

 shown in Langstroth's book 

 published in 1852, and infe- 

 rior to Huber'shive invent- 

 ed in the 18th century. Dr. 

 Dzierzon was also strongly 

 opposed to movable roofs, 

 one of the most important 

 features of Langstroth's hives. But, never- 

 theless, he worked out a system of bee-keep- 

 ing which achieved great results in Germany 

 and Austria-Hungary. 



Dr. Dzierzon was the chief agent in dis- 

 covering parthenogenesis as applied to bees, 

 and it is on this that his fame, I think, will 

 rest — at least we on this side of the Atlantic 

 will so regard it. He had great assistance, 

 however, from Professors Leuckart and von 

 Siebold in proving the theory to be true; in 

 fact, their part of the work called for great- 

 er skill than his. He was a great believer in 

 the utility of the Italian bee, and bred and 



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