16 SEMI-CENTENNIAL OF TORREY BOTANICAL CLUB 
dency, a new office at this time, was filled by the election of Dr. 
Timothy Field Allen, to whom tradition credits the first suggestion 
looking toward the formation of the Club. 
Dr. Thurber’s presidency covered a period of about seven 
years. The meeting-place of the Club continued to be the Her- 
barium of Columbia College, with which Dr. Torrey’s memory 
was so indissolubly associated. The Bulletin grew from a four- 
page to a twelve-page monthly, and the scope of the papers pub- 
lished broadened noticeably. In this connection it may be re- 
marked, however, that although the founders of the Club were 
mostly collectors, and their efforts were primarily devoted to the 
botanical exploration of the vicinity of New York City, it is evident 
that their work was limited only by the meagerness of their knowl- 
edge and the narrowness of their opportunity. Their interest in 
botany was as broad as the science itself, and their concept of the 
science no narrower, at least, than that of their contemporaries. 
The early pages of the Bulletin were devoted chiefly, it is true, to 
placing upon record stations for the flowering plants of the local 
flora; but even before the end of the first volume there was an im- 
portant illustrated paper on the structure of the flowers and fruit 
of Spirodela, and within a few years the taxonomy of the lower 
plants began to occupy a conspicuous place. There is no reason 
to believe that, from the very beginning, any botanical paper was 
ever excluded from the pages of the Bulletin because foreign to its 
field 
_ The need of a publication which would serve to assist corre- 
spondence between American botanists was filled by the appear- 
ance in the Bulletin for November, 1873, of a botanical directory 
for North America; additions and corrections were published in 
the Bulletin from time to time, and two supplements appeared 
separately; in 1878 a new edition was issued in pamphlet form. 
The reéstablishment of Cassino’s ''Naturalists' Directory" 
rendered further efforts in this direction superfluous. Dr. Thur- 
ber was followed in the presidency, in 1880, by John Strong New- 
berry, professor of geology at Columbia, and famous as a palaeo- 
botanist. Professor Newberry was the president of the Club for 
ten prosperous years—although the success of the organization 
then, as before and since, has been due rather to the faithful and 
