February, ’20] pierce: commercial and professional entomology 117 
tination. You recall, perhaps, the reports that have been published 
in our monthly Service and Regulatory Announcements of the findings 
in freight cars. You remember, perhaps, the items in relation to car¬ 
riage of the potato beetle and also refuse Florida oranges and vege¬ 
tables from Chicago to California. As a result of those findings, the 
Secretary of Agriculture addressed a letter to the railroad adminis¬ 
tration asking if measures could not be enforced to compel the cleaning 
of freight cars at the point of discharge of the contents, in order to 
prevent the carrying of pests. I think that is something that should 
be followed up. 
President W. C. O’Kane: We will now listen to Mr. Pierce’s 
paper on “ Commercial and Professional Entomology—The Future 
of Our Profession.” 
COMMERCIAL AND PROFESSIONAL ENTOMOLOGY—THE 
FUTURE OF OUR PROFESSION 
By W. Dwight Pierce, Consulting Entomologist, The Gage-Pierce Research 
Laboratories, Incorporated, Denver, Colo. 
We have for so many years looked upon entomology as either a 
pastime of men engaged in other occupations, or as a salaried federal, 
state or institutional profession, that we are apt to forget another 
very important branch of the science. In fact the rolls of our society 
have contained but few names of men who could not be classified 
under one of these heads. But this year it is different, and in coming 
years, the time is not far distant when the commercial and professional 
entomologists will outnumber their fellows. 
For at least ten years there has been a strong undercurrent of dis¬ 
cussion among the younger men in our science looking forward to the 
time when entomology would be unshackled and able to raise its head 
among the professional sciences. Many of us have realized the abso¬ 
lute impossibility of great progress in entomology until we could have 
at least as large a body of men unhampered by institutional or legis¬ 
lative restrictions, as there were under those conditions. We saw 
that when that happy day arrived the average pay in our profession 
would naturally be greater, because when a man has a chance to be a 
free agent he can bargain better for his salary. I recognize the fact 
that what I will say may open an entirely new line of thought to some 
of you and that some will not like to hear it. But I believe the major¬ 
ity will rejoice with me that the day is now at hand when entomology 
steps forth into new fields to make a new name for itself, as one of the 
great enconomic professions of the new world era. 
I do not know positively how many men are already in the practical 
