Elmer Ivan Applegate

Elmer Ivan Applegate (* March 31, 1867 near Ashland, Oregon, † November 18, 1949 in Williams, near Klamath Falls, Oregon ) was an American botanist. He studied especially the flora of his home in the state of Oregon and California. Applegate wrote a monograph on the genus of the dog teeth or lilies ( Erythronium ) and gave the first description to several species of this genus.

Life and work

Childhood and education

Elmer Ivan Applegate was born on 31 March 1867 in near Ashland in southern Oregon; According to the family Bible, he came to the land of his maternal grandfather, Sam Grubb, was born. His parents were Lucien Applegate and Margaret Grubb. His paternal grandfather, Lindsey Applegate, a motorman of the Applegate Wagon Train in the " Great Migration " of 1843 had been; Elmer's father Lucien was then a year old here. Elmer Ivan Applegate was the oldest of six children, two boys and four girls. His siblings were Minnie (1869-1951), Fred (1871-1953), (also called Eva, 1875-1965 ) Evelyn, Bessie ( 1879-1918 ) and Elsie ( 1881-1965 ). When Elmer was two years old, the family moved to Brookside Ranch in Upper Swan Lake Valley, east of Klamath Falls located. Father Lucien began in 1869, first by the family separated the management of 5,000 acres ( 20 km ²) ranch. A year later, his wife Margaret with the three-year Elmer and his little sister Minnie according to him.

The family spent many winters in California where kids high school and university attended and enjoyed musical training. For example, Elmer 1884 was in Santa Barbara; in the following year 1885 his father built a house in the Californian city of Ontario. 1891 Elmer stayed in this place on Ontario, and the following year 1892, he signed a shorthand course at Woodbury Business College in Los Angeles from. During a summer stay on the family ranch in Oregon Elmer learned ranching. He showed early botanical interest and collected a large number of unnamed plants in his childhood.

He received his formal botanical training not later than in 1894 at the California State Normal School of San Jose. With its already ordinary botanical knowledge he impressed there 's botany teacher Volney Rattan, who until his retirement in 1906 was botany teacher at this school in 1889 and the font Popular Flora of California wrote.

From the spring of 1895 visited Elmer Stanford University, where he probably heard a semester botany under Professor William Russel Dudley. Elmer never received a degree at Stanford University. A message from the Oregon Daily Journal of 24 November 1949 to the effect that he had received an honorary degree from Stanford is not true. Elmer graduated from Stanford University with no study, as it had only weak eyesight; the eye disease plagued him for most of his life.

From 1895 to 1896 Applegate was very successful with the plant collection, as is apparent from its existing in the Oregon State University herbarium collections. From 1896 and 1898 he spent five months of the year at Frederick Vernon Coville ( 1867-1937 ) at the Department of Agriculture of the United States (U.S. Department of Agriculture, abbreviated USDA). Coville was a senior botanist and curator of the National Herbarium; under him Applegate made ​​plant observations and collections in the Cascade Mountains from Klamath Falls to Portland. In between - secured in winter 1896/1897 - he had to take care of his father's farm. In the winter of 1898/1899 he worked in Washington DC, where he ordered Covilles plant collections. The collections are kept in the National Herbarium.

Wedding and spending time with his wife Esther

Elmer married on July 5, 1899 Esther Emily Ogden, who came from a settler family from Grass Valley in California. Her father Robert Ogden came in 1849 from Illinois to the gold deposits. Born near the California Nevada City Esther grew up in California and completed her education at the University of California at Berkeley from. Before marriage she taught for 16 years in the Miss Head 's Finishing School for Girls in Oakland. For a time she made nature and geography studies for the San Bernardino Schools, and it is likely that Elmer and Esther met in San Bernardino, as Elmer lived there. Esther was a niece of Peter Skene Ogden explorers, of a delegation of the Hudson 's Bay Company Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River to southern Oregon headed as a mountain guide from 1826 to 1827 and thus became famous. To be held in Nevada City, California Wedding Elmer 32, Esther was 34 years old. The marriage remained childless. The couple lived in Klamath Falls and had a small farm there.

Applegate's wife Esther was a talented painter who worked with watercolors, pastels and oil paints. She drew the collected plant specimens from her husband while he botanized this. Your paint work led to Empire -bond paper first as a line drawing, and then worked with water colors. She accompanied Elmer also with excursions to collecting plants along the Pacific coast and inland to the Rocky Mountains.

Elmer Applegate worked from about 1905 with the organization of the Klamath Irrigation Project and has at times been first secretary of the project. He was a driving force behind the foundation of the Western Reclamation Association ( National Federation of Irrigation Associations).

Built in 1908 Elmer and Esther a bungalow in Klamath Falls, located on the corner of Eberlein Street and Austin Street. A boundary of the property formed the main irrigation canal. The house is still surrounded by a grove of trees, the Elmer had planted.

After years in which the couple had concentrated more on the operation of the farm and local issues, Apple Gate turned away in 1923 increased to botany. From 1928 to 1934, and again from 1934 to 1938 he was Acting Director of the Dudley Herbarium at Stanford University.

Age

Applegate's wife Esther died on August 9, 1931 of a stroke. The loss hit hard Elmer, which is also from the following words, which he at Roxana Stinchfield Ferris († 1978) wrote originate. Ferris was for 47 years the members of the Stanford University employs Dudley Herbarium, and with it, Elmer was on botanical subjects in contact.

" During all the years we were together, I was rarely away from Esther, even for a day. In all my under takings, her help and sympathey [sic ] and encouragement were my inspiration. Added to this was a rare comradeship did made ​​life very beautiful. And so I find it most dificult [sic ] to bear up under the great sense of loss. Her wish Has always been did I carry on no matter what happened. "

" During all our years together, I was rarely separated from Esther, even for a single day. In all my things inspired me their help, their sympathy and encouragement. In addition, she was a true comrade, who made very beautiful my life. Now it is extremely difficult for me to maintain my stance in the face of severe loss. My wish was always that I go on, no matter what would happen. "

After this drastic event to Elmer depth with all the strength in botany; at this stage, he created his most important botanical contributions. He wrote his monograph on the genus Erythronium and a flora of the located in Oregon Crater Lake National Park and one of Northern California's Lava Beds National Monument. At the age of 67 years he took a job in 1934 as a " Park Ranger ( naturalist ) " at Crater Lake National Park, which he held until 1939.

The unofficial guardian of the family history of Elmer's father Lucien Applegate Cressa Vineup ( Grubb ) Tennant, told the following story about Elmer from his time when he worked for the National Park Service at Crater Lake National Park:

" Elmer was a very slight one about 5 feet 10 inches tall who wore thick heavy glasses and could not see well even with Those. One time, he was up at Crater Lake. They always wanted him to have somebody to go with him. He told me, ' I do not want anybody with me. They hold me back. ' Well one day he went alone and got down nest in Annie Creek Canyon and he got into a hornet 's. He knocked off his glasses and They fell down into the water, clear down the mountain. He was there all night. He could not find his way out. Then They told him he had to have someone with him. They would not let him go alone after that. Elmer, who in his sixties which at the time, said ' They just hold me back. I do not like to work with them. ' "

" Elmer was a very slender, about 1.75 meters tall man who wore thick glasses and even with these could not see well. An incident occurred when he was at Crater Lake above. [You are probably meant the other members of the staff of park rangers ] urged him always that he should take someone as a companion. He told me, ' I want to have no one there. You just keep me. ' One day he was traveling alone and got into the Annie Creek Canyon, where he ran into a hornet's nest. He struck off his glasses, which fell down the hill and into the water. He spent the whole night and could not find the way out. Then she told him that he must always take a companion and left him alone since no more away. Elmer, who was then in his 60s, said, you just keep me. I do not like to work with them. ' "

Until 1938, Applegate Honorary Acting Curator of the Herbarium Dudley remained at Stanford University. Then he drove his botanical activities down significantly. In 1939 he published nor his most extensive work, which is about 90 -page Plants of Crater Lake National Park. Although it is often called the "first flora of Crater Lake ", but Frederick Lyle Wynd was before him, who published in 1936 a flora of Crater Lake National Park in the American Midland Naturalist.

In September 1939, Elmer sold most of his possessions in Klamath Falls and moved to Williams in Josephine County, Oregon. There he lived near his sisters Evelyn and Elsie at Williams Creek; later his sister Minnie lived there. The Applegate- siblings were self catering and therefore survived the restrictions of the Second World War without any problems. In 1946, she had regular supplies of meat, fruit and vegetables, and dairy products were available to them. The other hand, sugar was scarce.

On November 16, 1949 Elmer Ivan Applegate died at the home of his sisters. He was buried in the link Ville Cemetery in Klamath Falls, where his wife and other relatives are buried.

His plant collections are today housed at the California Academy of Sciences of Oregon State University and at Crater Lake National Park.

Research

Applegate researched mainly to native plants in the western United States from California to Oregon. His most popular field of research was the plant genus of the dog teeth or lilies ( Erythronium ), about which he wrote a monograph, which was published in 1935 in the Madroño, the journal of the California Botanical Society. He had collected since childhood specimens of a species of this genus, which was still not named. In 1941 he described together with the botanist Morton Peck of Willamette University, the plant Frasera umpquaensis from the family of gentian plants.

Here is a list of nominated by Applegate taxa with regard to publish location and year:

• Downingia Sikota Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:97, 1929.
• Downingia yina Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:97, 1929.
• Erythronium giganteum subsp. leucandrum Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:189, 1933.
• Erythronium grandiflorum subsp. chrysandrum Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:190, 1933.
• Erythronium helenae Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:188, 1933.
• Erythronium klamathense Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:151, 1930.
• Erythronium nudopetalum Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:189, 1933.
• Erythronium oregonum Applegate Madroño 3:99, 1935.
• Erythronium oregonum subsp. leucandrum Applegate Madroño 3:106, 1935.
• Erythronium tuolumnense Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:153, 1930.
• Frasera umpquaensis M.Peck & Applegate Madroño 6:12, 1941.
• Mertensia siskiyouensis Applegate, Contrib. Dudley Herb. 1:154, 1930.

In addition, he was also active in the field of paleobotany. He had a collection of fossil plants from near Ashland, Oregon, which he bequeathed to the palaeobotanist CH Knowlton. This published collection of Applegate's two new species, which he named Quercus applegatei and Ficus andersonii; the specific epithet honors andersonii while Elmer's cousin Frank Anderson, who was a geologist and the LaBrea Tar Pits discovered.

Honors

The epithets following plant species have been named in his honor:

• Astragalus applegatei M.Peck, Proc. Biol Soc. Wash. 49:111, 1936.
• Castilleja applegatei Fernald, Erythea 6:49, 1898.
• Lecanora applegatei Herre, Bryologist 47:24, 1944.
• Quercus applegatei FWKnowlt. , U.S. Geol Survey, 20th Ann. Report pt 3, 42, 1900.

1940 Applegate received an honorary doctorate from Oregon State College.

Writings

Applegate's most extensive writings are the following three:

• The genus Erythronium: a taxonomic and distributional study of western North American species. In: Madroño. 3, 1935, pp. 58-113.
• Plants of Lava Beds National Monument, California. In: American Midland Naturalist. 19, 1938, pp. 334-367.
• Plants of Crater Lake National Park. In: American Midland Naturalist. 22, 1939, pp. 225-314.

His other published articles are:

• Two new Downingias from Oregon. In: Contrib. Dudley Herb., Stanford Univ .. Volume 1, 1929, pp. 97-98.
• Some undescribed plants form the Pacific states. In: Contrib. Dudley Herb., Stanford Univ .. Volume 1, 1930, pp. 151-154.
• New western Erythroniums. In: Contrib. Dudley Herb., Stanford Univ .. Volume 1, 1933, pp. 188-190.
• The flora of Iceland Wizard. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. Volume 7, No. 1, 1934, pp. 7-8 ( HTML version).
• Applegate 's paint-brush on Applegate Peak. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. Volume 7, No. 3, 1934, p 10 ( HTML version).
• Monkey- flowers of Crater Lake. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. 8 (1 ), 1935, pp. 9-10 ( HTML version).
• Latest flowering plants in Crater Lake National Park. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. Volume 7, No. 2, 1935, pp. 9-10 ( HTML version).
• Some fruits of Crater Lake plants. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. Volume 7, No. 3, 1935, pp. 6-9 ( HTML version).
• Report of Botanical Activities for 1936. Crater Lake National Park, 1936.
• Some plants common to Crater Lake National Park and the Lava Beds National Monument. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. 9, 1936, pp. 3-4 ( HTML version).
• The Flowering Seasons of Crater Lake Plants. In: Nature Notes from Crater Lake National Park. 11, No. 1, 1938 ( HTML version).
• Information Bulletin - 10/07/37 EAR. Crater Lake National Park, 1937.

Applegate was also co- author of a Provisional Manual for the Crater Lake National Park:

• Provisional Manual of Information. 1934 (PDF, 2.9 MB).

Some other writings of Applegate are preserved, but not published.

Swell

• Frank A. Lang: Elmer Ivan Applegate (1867-1994): The Erythronium Man. In: Kalmiopsis. 10, 2003, pp. 3-12 (PDF, 4.3 MB, in dortiger pagination pp. 1-10).
• Fritz Encke, Günther Buchheim, Siegmund Seybold: Dictionary of Plant Names. Founded by Robert Zander. 13th edition. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart ( Hohenheim), 1984, ISBN 3-8001-5042-5.