BIOGRAPHY OF L. L. LANGSTROTH 



Lorenzo Lorrain Langstroth, the "father of American 

 Apiculture," was bom in the city of Philadelphia, December 

 25, 1810. He early showed unusual interest in insect life. His 

 parents were intelligent and in comfortable circumstances, 

 but they were not pleased to see him "waste so much time" in 

 digging holes in the gravel walks, filling them with crumbs of 

 bread and dead flies, to watch the curious habits of the ants. 

 No books of any kind on natural history were put into his 

 hands, but, on the contrary, much was said to discourage his 

 "strange notions." Still he persisted in his observations, and 

 gave to them much of the time that his playmates spent in 

 sport. 



In 1827, he entered Yale College, graduating in 1831. His 

 father's means having failed, he supported himself by teach- 

 ing, while pursuing his theological studies. After serving as 

 mathematical tutor in Yale College for nearly two years, he 

 was ordained Pastor of a Congregational church in Andover, 

 Massachusetts, in May, 1836, and was married in August of 

 that year to Miss A. M. Tucker of New Haven. 



Strange to say, notwithstanding his passion in early life 

 for studying the habits of insects, he took no interest in such 

 pursuits during his college life. In 1837, the sight of a glass 

 vessel filled with beautiful comb honey, on the table of a 

 friend, led him to visit the attic where the bees were kept. 

 This revived all his enthusiasm, and before he went home he 

 purchased two colonies of bees in old box hives. The only lit- 



