Ohio History Journal

DR. JOHN MILTON BIGELOW, 1804-1878

AN EARLY OHIO PHYSICIAN--BOTANIST

 

By A. E. WALLER*

 

Meeting the name Bigelow in botanical publication the reader

is sometimes confused. The name of John M. Bigelow, the sub-

ject of this paper is close to John Bigelow a journalist and news-

paper correspondent of New York City of the same period and

also to a Dr. Henry Jacob Bigelow interested in anesthetics of

whom this paper will make no further mention, as well as to Dr.

Jacob Bigelow of Massachusetts.

Dr. Jacob Bigelow1 requires a brief notice here since he is

more frequently mistaken for John M. Dr. Jacob Bigelow in

₁81₄ published a list of the plants growing in the vicinity of Bos-

ton under the title Florula Bostonensis. It became a popular

work for all those persons wanting a small guide book to the

plants of the area and it passed through three editions. It fol-

lowed the Linnean Sexual System for naming plants. The 1824

edition is sometimes offered for sale as a literary curiosity, having

the reputation of being the last work published in the United

States which followed the Linnean system. Dr. Jacob Bigelow

also authored the American Medical Botany, a recognized fore-

runner of the modern American pharmacopoeia establishing the

standard practice for the current Food and Drug Acts. Three

volumes of this work were published between 1818 and 1820. As

a result of this great editorial labor Dr. Jacob Bigelow was the

correspondent of a number of scientific men in European coun-

tries. The Swiss botanist, De Candolle, honored and commemor-

ated his name by applying it to a newly discovered golden rod.

Dr. Asa Gray of Harvard described several American species in

 

* Papers from the Department of Botany, Ohio State University, No. 449.

1 Howard Kelly, Some American Medical Botanists (Troy, New York, 1914).

(313)

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314   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

this genus, Bigelovia. Dr. Jacob Bigelow's name is to that ex-

tent perpetuated for the botanists. By the rules of priority fol-

lowed in naming plants, the creation of this genus automatically

prevented John M. Bigelow having any of the genera he discov-

ered named in his honor. There are a number of species, new to

science when he collected them, carrying his name.

Even the most virtuous, however, are not above folly. It

does not harm the memory of Dr. Jacob Bigelow now to record

that once he was a member of a committee of Boston citizens who

solemnly listened to statements of eight persons who swore they

had seen a sea serpent off the Massachusetts coast. In all serious-

ness the committee prepared a pamphlet from these hearings and

sent it off to the distinguished explorer and sea captain, Sir Joseph

Banks, in 1817. Astonished but canny, Sir Joseph replied, as

might the scientist of today under similar circumstances, that

"future observation will no doubt clear up" the remarks noted

in the pamphlet.

This connection with the Atlantic seaboard and Europe will

or should be sufficient to clear up the confusion between Jacob

Bigelow and John M. Bigelow. For John M. spent all but a few

years of his life in Ohio and Michigan, and his botanical collec-

tions cover the southwest and include Texas, New Mexico, Ari-

zona and California, as well as his early work in central Ohio.

Dr. John M. Bigelow's birth reputedly occurred in Peru, Ben-

nington County, Vermont, June 23, 1804.2 In 1815 his father

moved to Licking County, Ohio, near or in Granville, where he

had his boyhood schooling. This was meager and the family was

poor. Young John was a voracious reader and spent time poring

over any books he could obtain. Legend also drapes him with the

familiar garments of a boyish school teacher by which means he

earned enough money to attend and receive a diploma March 8,

1832, from the Medical College of Ohio at Cincinnati.

In November, 1832, he married Maria L. Meiers, daughter

of H. Meiers, Esq., of Lancaster, Ohio. At the Medical College

 

2 W. B. Atkinson, Physicians and Surgeons of U. S. (Philadelphia, 1878).

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58            315

 

of Ohio, Dr. John Leonard Riddell3 was professor of botany and

adjunct professor of chemistry between 1830 and 1836. It may

well have been this mentor's enthusiasm that was communicated

to John M. Bigelow and inspired in him a love of plants that was

to remain with him throughout his life. Dr. Riddell's Synopsis

of the Flora of the Western States published in 1835, together

with a supplementary Ohio list is the first catalog of Ohio plants

published by a resident botanist. There is, however, no written

testimony to prove this interesting teacher-pupil relation.

The first public record of Bigelow's medical practice is from

the Lancaster, Ohio, Gazette and Enquirer of January 2, 1834.

It reads, "Dr. J. M. Bigelow has removed his office to his dwelling

on Columbus Street, a few doors south of General Sanderson's

residence." A small but thoughtful notice establishing a young

medical practitioner in a distinguished neighborhood. He was

about 30 years old, and was beginning to take his place in the com-

munity. Similar notices of changes of address, probably because

of the increases in the size of his family or because he was seeking

a more convenient office and of medical partnerships formed and

dissolved are to be found in the Lancaster newspapers between

1834 and 1860. It is thus known that he was associated in a

partnership with Dr. Robert McNeil in 1844-1845. This is the

younger Robert McNeil who, in 1847, became a surgeon in the

Mexican War. Again in 1856 he formed a partnership with Dr.

G. W. Boerstler which lasted for two years. Dr. Boerstler was

a founder of the Ohio State Medical Society, and active through-

out his long life as a Lancaster physician.

Aside from the assumption that the partnerships displayed

good sense in increasing his office practice, what we now know of

Dr. Bigelow indicates that he had his own reasons for wishing to

be away from his office. We do not know exactly how remu-

nerative or absorbing his work with his patients may have been.

We do know that he was developing another sort of work that

was to demand a share of his time. His other love was botaniz-

 

3 Clara Armstrong, "Plant Names Commemorative of Ohio Botanists," Ohio

Naturalist (January, 1901).

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316   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

ing and he was beginning to collect plants zealously and with a

growing understanding.

It should be remembered that in the period of which we now

are writing, a doctor was keenly interested in observing and know-

ing plants. He would want to identify them and if possible find

those used in pharmaceutical preparations. This no doubt calls

to the reader's mind the names of Dr. Asa Gray and Dr. John

Torrey, American botanists and both holders of degrees in medi-

cine.

Purely utilitarian ideas however were not always uppermost

in the minds of these men. Ohio was just in process of being

carved from wilderness. Torrey and Gray were just beginning

to accumulate materials from which the knowledge of North

American plants was built. The earliest plant collectors and

botanists were European and a great many of the type specimens

of our commonest plants are in European herbaria. You will also

remember that as the applications of the plant sciences to agri-

culture, horticulture, forestry, pedology and other fields of learn-

ing were scarcely dreamed of at that time, training in medicine

and pharmacy were almost the only courses of study which in-

cluded any subject to which the name botany might apply. In

short botany and medicine were closely allied, as they had been

for many centuries previously.

One can, therefore, see in Dr. Bigelow's medical partnerships

and in his absences from his office the same urge that assails many

another doctor who wishes to find out more about his medical

work or to explore it from another angle. In the case of Dr.

Bigelow this was eventually to lead him into the field of plant

collecting wherein his claim to fame is well established. His re-

search took him from the town of Lancaster farther out into the

country and finally across the continent to the Pacific Ocean.

Materia Medica was in Bigelow's day largely obtained from the

plant kingdom.

Fortunately one can trace the way in which John Milton

Bigelow's activity forms a link in the great chain of scientific ex-

ploration to discover the physical extent and the nature of the

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58                317

then unknown parts of continental United States. Not later than

1840, though how much earlier it is defficult to say, he had be-

come acquainted with William S. Sullivant, at that time a student

of plant life. A letter4 to Torrey and Gray in the files of the

Torrey letters in the New York Botanical gardens dated Decem-

ber 29, 1840, sets forth the facts, and establishes itself as his first

letter to Dr. Torrey. He writes: "The whole subject of my let-

ter, I give as the apology that might seem necessary in a total

stranger addressing you."   He also mentions he is sending cer-

tain plants notably asters and golden rods for further identifica-

tion. The significant fact is this statement, "Last summer I col-

lected pretty thoroughly, having been stimulated to it by an ac-

quaintance with Mr. William S. Sullivant of Columbus." He

apologizes that his plants are not put up with the neatness required

of a professed botanist. "Many times some of my most interest-

ing specimens are brought home in my hat and probably before I

have time to smooth out some of the wrinkles consequent upon

their cramped position in the hat, a call is made post haste and

my poor plants are obliged to suffer the withering influences of a

hot summer day," he complains. The letter further contains one

other important item showing that Dr. Bigelow was more than

an ordinary country town doctor. He states, "I am also anxious

to get a good microscope; if Dr. Gray can procure one from

France of the quality and at the price of Mr. Sullivant's I should

be glad."

What are the threads connecting these names and events?

Sullivant, distinguished resident of Columbus, was the oldest son

of Lucas Sullivant, the surveyor, who died a wealthy land-owner.

His son, William Starling Sullivant, having spent approximately

twenty years since his father's death in consolidating and increas-

ing his fortune had, about 1839, decided to turn his attention to

botany. He was later to become so noteworthy for his studies of

 

4 a. The Bigelow letters to Dr. John Torrey are on file in the New York Botanical

Gardens, Bronx Park, N. Y. The entire collection was recently photostated for Mr.

A. D. Rodgers to whom thanks are due for permission to examine and use them. h.

For all the newspaper notices from Lancaster, Ohio, grateful acknowledgement is

herewith offered to Edward S. Thomas and the WPA assistants at the Ohio State

Archaeological and Historical Society Museum.

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318   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

mosses as to be known as the "father of American Bryology."

The account of his career has recently been made the subject of

a book by A. D. Rodgers.⁵ Sullivant at that time was just get-

ting started and had been for three years in correspondence with

Dr. Torrey and Dr. Gray, America's two leading botanists. Early

in the year 1840, Sullivant had published his first botanical trea-

tise, A Catalogue of Plants Native or Naturalized in the Vicin-

ity of Columbus, Ohio. Dr. Bigelow's letter to Torrey and

Gray indicates at this time that he knew Sullivant well enough to

have heard of his work, perhaps even to have seen the precious

microscope or used it, and to want one of his own at the same

price. May it not be inferred that Bigelow possessed an interest

in medicine and botany that is superior to idle curiosity and that

he was wealthy enough to afford such a scientific luxury as a

good microscope? He was at least bold enough to ask.

Dr. Asa Gray's name and career,⁶ well known to almost

everyone who has a nodding acquaintance with American plants

needs little mention here. It may be recalled, however, that at

this time (1838) he had been chosen professor of botany in the

newly founded University of Michigan, but as the buildings were

not completed, the Regents had entrusted to him the assignment

of making the first purchase of books for the general library and

sent him abroad with a fund of five thousand dollars to buy the

books. This unusual procedure on the part of the Regents not

only resulted in beneficial sequences to the Michigan Library but

Dr. Gray met Darwin and Hooker in England and other scien-

tists on the European continent and formed lasting friendships.

On his return from Europe, the pleased Regents extended Dr.

Gray's leave for a year. As everyone knows he worked with Dr.

Torrey on the flora of North America and later went to Harvard

instead of assuming his post at Michigan. Dr. Gray had brought

a microscope which was shipped to Sullivant in April, 1840. In

May, 1840, Sullivant wrote Gray that he was making "short trips

around the country of 2-3-4 days." It may have been in these

 

5 A. D. Rodgers, Noble Fellow (New York, 1940).

6 A. E. Waller. See foreword in Rodger's book cited above.

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58             319

short trips that Sullivant first met Bigelow. He does not happen

to have mentioned how or where the meeting took place. Yet the

remarks quoted from Bigelow's letter above prove that Bigelow

knew all about Sullivant's microscope, doubtless the first one in

central Ohio, and that he considered himself an able enough scien-

tist to request that Dr. Gray perform for him the same kindness

he had for Sullivant.  Sullivant's microscope was one of the

earliest brought into Ohio.

The point of all of this is its significance for early Ohio plant

studies. Sullivant's catalogue of the plants collected near Colum-

bus was followed the next year by Bigelow's Florula Lancas-

triensis.⁷ John M. Bigelow's title for this work follows the Jacob

Bigelow Florula Bostonensis. It is known that Sullivant possessed

a copy of this popular plant guide. The Florula Lancastriensis

of John M. Bigelow has the subtitle of a catalogue Comprising

nearly all the flowering and filicoid plants growing naturally

within the limits of Fairfield County, with notes of such as are

of medical value. For the grasses and sedges credit is given to

Dr. Asa Horr who lived in the northern portion of Fairfield

County at Baltimore, Ohio. The paper was presented, at least by

title (one can hardly imagine anyone having the courage to read

a lengthy list of plant names) to the Medical Convention of Ohio

in May, 1841. It was published in the Proceedings of that con-

vention. The minutes of the meeting record that a vote of thanks

was tendered to Dr. Bigelow for presenting it.

At the present time not more than three copies of the

Bigelow-Horr paper are known to exist. The Florula Lancas-

triensis has frequently been referred to in the century that has

passed since its publication. Notice of it is contained in Dr.

Britton's compilation of State and Local Floras, and in the Torrey

Bulletin. It formed the basis for some of the plants not seen but

included "Fide Bigelow," in the Sugar Grove paper of Dr. Robert

F. Griggs.⁸

 

7 John M. Bigelow, "Florula Lancastriensis," Proceedings Ohio Medical Convention

(Columbus, 1841).

8 Robert F. Griggs, "A Botanical Survey of the Sugar Grove Region," Ohio

Biological Survey 1, No. 3.

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320   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

Asa Horr9 was born in Worthington, Ohio, September 2,

1817. Originally the family name had been spelled Hoar. Asa

received his M. D. from the Cleveland Medical College and began

to practice medicine in Baltimore, Fairfield County, Ohio. It is

not known how or where he became acquainted with Dr. Bigelow.

He did not remain in Ohio, however, for many years after the

Florula Lancastriensis was published. In 1846 he moved to Ga-

lena, Illinois, and in 1847 to Dubuque, Iowa. Dubuque was to

remain his home for the rest of his life. Dr. Asa Horr is at the

moment a forgotten man in Ohio medical history, but his career

was remarkable. Interested in botany, mineralogy, astronomy

and meteorology, he was with Professor Lapham of Milwaukee

the inventor of the methods for forecasting the weather for the

United States weather reports. He established a private astro-

nomical observatory in Dubuque in 1864 and was the first to de-

termine accurately the longitude of that city. He was examining

surgeon to the United States recruiting service during the War

between the States and in 1875 examining surgeon to the United

States Pension Bureau. He was president of the Dubuque Medi-

cal Society, a founder of the Iowa Institute of Sciences and Arts

in 1868, and its president in 1869. In 1872 he was president of

the American Association for the Advancement of Science and

one of a hundred English and American short-hand writers chosen

to make improvements in phonography. He deserves a special

study as one of Ohio's early medical botanists, but this brief men-

tion must suffice.

How much help Dr. Bigelow received in the preparation of

his work from his friend Sullivant or from Torrey, Gray or Horr

may not be important. Ten plants of the list are specially marked

with credit to W. S. Sullivant, twelve are similarly credited to

Asa Horr. It is clear that they all knew of his work and that his

own labors of collecting were benefitted by the knowledge and the

experience of these four notable contemporaries. The list con-

tains eight-hundred seventy-one flowering plants and ferns. Some

of the species also are found in Franklin County and included in

Sullivant's list. Some, particularly the plants of acid soils, are

9 Kelly and Burrage, American Medical Biographies (Baltimore, 1920).

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58            321

 

excluded from the Franklin County list. Rhododendron is in-

cluded from Hocking County, as is Iris lacustris. Its larger con-

gener, Iris cristata, widely distributed in Ohio is not mentioned.

Bigelow did not collect the Rhododendron specimen himself,

but gives it as collected by Jacob Greene "near the mouth of

Clear Creek." The patch of Rhododendron known now is within

a quarter mile of the intersection of the Fairfield-Hocking bound-

ary with Clear Creek Valley. It is nearer to the village of Re-

venge than it is to the mouth of Clear Creek. The two lists, Sul-

livant's and Bigelow's, together make an unusually complete ac-

count of plant records of central Ohio a hundred years ago. About

the same time Thomas G. Lea of Cincinnati, collecting between

1834-1844, prepared a manuscript of his list of plants of that

region. In 1849 Sullivant, after Lea's death, edited and published

from his manuscripts. Thus the Ohio Country has botanical lists

of a century ago that are today invaluable.

It is unfortunate that the possible existence of the herbarium

of Bigelow's Ohio specimens is not known. The collections of

Sullivant were by his wish given to the Gray Herbarium after his

death in 1873. His microscopes went to the Starling Medical

College. Thomas Lea's collections were sent to the Philadelphia

Museum of Natural Sciences. The absence of the Bigelow col-

lections led Dr. Griggs to doubt in some cases certain plants named

in his list. Yet to the credit of Dr. Bigelow's and Dr. Asa Horr's

keen powers of observation, it should be stated, that year by year

as Fairfield and Hocking Counties have been revisited many of

the doubtful specimens have been collected.

Some interesting items selected from Dr. Bigelow's list in-

clude 26 ferns, 18 orchids, 68 grasses. Among 65 sedges 45 are

species of the genus Carex, in which Sullivant was for a time in-

terested. Medicinally noteworthy are 5 species of Lobelia, 3 of

Gentian, 8 species of boneset. The European species of Saponaria

is recorded. Apparently a hundred years ago it had already be-

come naturalized in Ohio. There are medical notations on 190

of the plants in the list.

From another point of view the Florula Lancastriensis de-

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322   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

serves special mention.  It apparently brought to a close the

herborizing activities of medical botanists of this section of the

United States. From this time onward botanists were less in-

terested in the medicinal value of Ohio's plants. The collections

were made by men who began to specialize in the taxonomic

groups. The old urge to find new plants to use in medicines goes

back a long time. As Monardes said in Seville in 1577 in his

Joyfull Newes out of the Newe Founde Worlde (Frampton's

translation, 1577), "as there are discovered new Regions, New

Kingdoms, New Provinces by our Spaniards so they have brought

into us new medicines, and new remedies, wherewith they do cure

many infirmities, which if we did lack them, would be incurable

and without any Remedie." Many Europeans looked to America

to furnish the road to health.

Botany and medicine of the previous centuries were very

much together. It has frequently been stated that the need for

an accurate plant nomenclature had its beginning in medicine.

From the middle of the nineteenth century their ways were to

become parted. Dr. John Milton Bigelow was one of those who

was to see this parting and perhaps deplore some of its effects.

He was himself always to follow plant collecting and in his sev-

entieth year of age to publish lists of plant families with notes on

the medicinal plants, and to teach to his students the plant lore he

so well loved. Perhaps in his own point of view he was a cham-

pion of the cause of materia medica from the plant kingdom. He

may have wanted to see the two old sciences remain together. He

was as successful as Canute in stemming the tides. The old herb-

orizing was swept away by newer, more refined chemical methods.

From Lancaster newspapers of early dates and other sources,

a brief record may be obtained of Dr. Bigelow's standing in the

community as a citizen. Both A. A. Graham's History of Fair-

field County and C. L. Wiseman's Centennial History of Lancas-

ter accord him prominence. When the first Board of Health for

Fairfield County was organized in 1837 one finds that he was a

member of this Board. He was a member of the committee call-

ing a meeting of all "Regular Scientific practitioners of Medicine

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58           323

and Surgery" to form a medical society which had for its object

the advancement of "medical literature and knowledge in the

great and extending west." A notice of this meeting appeared in

the Ohio Eagle and Fairfield Advertiser, February 24, 1838. Dr.

Bigelow was interested in education probably from his own well-

remembered days teaching school. He is mentioned as a member

of a committee "to visit and inquire into the condition of the com-

mon schools of the town"--later he was a school examiner. In

1843 he was named as treasurer of the Irish Repeal Association,

a temperance group formed by the Washington temperance move-

ment and the Irish Americans. When trouble and even threatened

military hostilities excited people over the Oregon boundary dis-

putes, Dr. Bigelow's name appears in the Ohio Eagle of June 12,

1845, in a notice that "in view of the menaces of war which Great

Britain has thought proper to make use of in reference to this

question" a meeting discussing the matter would take place.

Judging by all of the committee memberships and board work in

which he was engaged Dr. Bigelow's life must have been full.

There is a notice in the Ohio Eagle, October 30, 1845, calling at-

tention to the dissolving by mutual consent of the partnership

with Dr. McNeil. This notice adds, "persons with unsettled ac-

counts are earnestly requested to call and close them immediately."

Apparently this problem of medical practice is not unknown today.

There is no indication that Dr. Bigelow's practice made him

wealthy. He had a large family to rear. Apparently he lived in

comfortable circumstances. His wife, Mary, is known to have

been the sister of Mrs. Phelan. He was probably, like most coun-

try doctors, too busy serving his patients to worry much about

his income. His record as an exemplary citizen stands unchal-

lenged. The credits were on the giving rather on the receiving

end and still seems to be fairly typical of the doctors of small,

healthy thriving communities.

For reasons, now not known, he accepted, in 1850, the posi-

tion of surgeon on the Mexican Boundary Survey. Perhaps the

most reasonable explanation is his love for plants and his oppor-

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324   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

tunities to collect in new fields. His former partner, Robert

McNeil, may have told him about the country of the Southwest.

The survey of the United States-Mexican Boundary, with

R. B. Campbell, Col. J. D. Graham and J. R. Bartlett as com-

missioners in charge, was authorized in 1848. The boundary

crossed unknown, partly unexplored, territory. In its execution,

Torrey and Gray saw the opportunity to attach to field parties one

or more botanists to study and collect the plant life of the South-

west. From the start the whole affair was poorly managed. Bart-

lett, an ethnologist and antiquarian, has been most frequently

blamed for much of the bungling. Two treaties were signed. The

Guadaloupe-Hidalgo Treaty ended the war. The Gadsden Treaty

arranged for a purchase of a strip of land. Major W. H. Emory,

as astronomer, was sent, in 1849, to San Diego to run a line east-

ward. He had with him Dr. Charles C. Parry to study the geol-

ogy and the plant life. Parry described the plants around San

Diego, naming among other items the Torrey pine. He proceeded

to Yuma, Arizona, with Emory and when observations at that

point were completed the party and the astronomical instruments

were to be moved over to Texas. To do this they were obliged

to return to San Diego as no more direct road was open than via

the Isthmus of Panama.

The main party, with Commissioner Bartlett, was to go from

New York around to Indianola, Texas, by boat and thence to San

Antonio and El Paso. John M. Bigelow had been recommended

to Torrey by Sullivant, but Torrey as professor of chemistry in

Princeton and working also at Columbia was often difficult to

find. The following letter indicates this. It is written to Torrey

while Bigelow was in New York, July 25, 1850.

Dear Sir:

You may think I am crazy and I certainly know I am confused. This

is the third time I have attempted to transmit Mr. Sullivant's letter to you.

This is the charm. If I do not succeed this time I must give up in despair.

I saw Mr. Thurber and he thinks you may visit New York soon. If you

do will you be so kind as to let me know!

Yours most respectfully,

John M. Bigelow

 

 

*

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58                 325

 

Events were moving at a rapid clip for the Boundary Survey

when a month later Dr. Torrey wrote a letter to Dr. Gray who

was in the British Isles studying the North American plant col-

lections of various European herbaria. "It would not take more

than half a year to settle most of the knotty points in our botany

if we could both be with Bentham," he wrote. He also tried to

untangle the situations that troubled the collectors for the Bound-

ary Survey.    He mentioned Bartlett's appointment as commis-

sioner:

Bailey also informed me six weeks ago that he had recommended

Thurber of Providence as Botanist to the Survey not knowing anything

about Parry. Accordingly I at once wrote Bartlett informing him about

Parry's position and claims to the situation. He replied the appointment

had been made. He would retain Parry, as it was his intention to have a

full scientific corps. I communicated this to Parry by next steamer.

Afterwards I found that a Dr. Bigelow of Ohio had also been appointed

Surgeon and Botanist to the Survey. Bigelow was strongly recommended

by Sullivant but I think he is not a Botanist. He and Thurber came here

to see me. Neither of them, I believe, have the official title of Botanist.

The former is Surgeon, the latter a "computer", but both are expected to do

duty as botanists. The commission has left it to themselves to settle the

question of botanical rank but Bigelow in his letter writes to Thurber as

his assistant. Thurber says he will not play second fiddle to such a poor

stick. The commission will certainly have a full staff of Botanists when

all three are on the ground.

Dr. Torrey's fears were to prove more than imaginary.

The next letter from Bigelow indicated that the parties in

the field were proceeding with their work. Bigelow had seen an

interesting walnut which he would have liked for Torrey to dedi-

cate to Lieut. Whipple. There is no mention of wrangling with

Thurber. They did not always travel together. Thurber and

Bartlett followed the northern route. Bigelow took the southern

route.  Parry eventually met them  and also a fourth botanist,

Charles Wright, a life-long friend of Dr. Gray. Wright had col-

lected in Texas previously. He probably knew, more than the

others, what the collecting difficulties were -- most particularly

lack of facilities for drying and preserving specimens to suit the

needs of critical examiners. Bigelow is known to have made the

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326   OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

same complaints and Torrey, in turn, found some fault with many

of Bigelow's specimens. Bigelow had not understood at first that

every plant new to him was not a new plant. He had not been

aware of Wright's previous collections nor of Parry's successes

around San Diego. He was disappointed to learn that some of

his collections contained plants already named. For as there was

no grasp of modern plant ecology, where the specimen was picked

up was only a minor matter. When Gray published the Plantae

Wrightianae Bigelow felt he deserved a larger share of credit and

some years afterwards wrote he had been "Wrightized" out of

his plants. On the whole he was cheerful, however, and often

the best companion of the party. He was the oldest of the four

botanists, being, in 1850, 46 years of age. Wright was 39, Thur-

ber 29; Parry, the youngest, was 27. All of them, for endurance

and fidelity to duty, deserve praise without stint.

Of particular interest at the present time, one of John M.

Bigelow's newly discovered plants was an arid land shrub. Dr.

Asa Gray described it and named it Parthenium argentatum.

Bigelow found it near Escondido Creek, Texas, in 1852. Today

it is grown by its Mexican name guayule. When chopped and

macerated it yields a satisfactory amount of rubber in fair qual-

ity. In 1917, methods of getting seeds to germinate readily were

devised and in the present emergency, attention is being given to

its cultivation. This single discovery should serve to focus atten-

tion, perhaps on Bigelow at the moment, but more importantly on

the permanent debt of civilization to its botanical explorers. Dr.

Bigelow knew little about the value of his discovery or the years

of research and the millions of capital that would go into prob-

lems of the development of a rubber supply.

Bigelow deserves a belated laurel for a constructive sugges-

tion that was to save the botanical records from utter confusion.

It was to wait and publish results only after all the materials were

assembled. This simple solution saved an otherwise impossible

situation. For Gray had already published some of Wright's

early collections. If this practice had been continued the whole

matter would have gone out of hand. Torrey's work in the

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58              327

Boundary Survey Report is complete. The confusion resulting

from the several collectors rushing into print was avoided since

all the work had to pass under the watchful eyes of Torrey and

Gray. So Bigelow of whom Torrey had written in the letter

quoted above "he is not a botanist" in a peculiar sense performed

for botany the greatest service.

Passing over much correspondence during this field work

period, a letter dated January 23, 1853, tells Torrey he would

soon be back in Lancaster. From here he wrote March 19,

With regard to the disposition of our plants, you will please let me know

as soon as you get something definite from Maj. Emory. By what I hear

from Washington our Commission, I judge, is in rather a state of jumble.

I am told Congress passed a deficiency for the relief of Maj. Emory's party,

but whether any of it can be used for scientific purposes is more than I

know.

Actually Commissioner Bartlett was removed and Maj. Emory

was appointed instead as Commissioner. Bigelow followed his let-

ter with a visit to see Torrey about the plant collections in New

York a month later. On his return this interesting commentary

on travel at that date is given: "I arrived safely in Columbus

34 hours from New York, but behold after arriving within 28

miles of my home it cost me 61 hours to get here. I arrived at

Columbus at 3 o'clock A. M. on Saturday, but every seat in the

coach for my town was taken. Our mail is daily only through

the week."

He had made Torrey his friend by showing how he could

serve botany. His talents as a collector were proved and his ex-

perience was valuable. His next letter May 21, 1853, had a piece

of great news. He told Torrey he had received from Lieut.

Whipple the commission of assistant on the Southern Railway

Route to the Pacific and was "assigned as Surgeon and Botanist

to this expedition."

The Lancaster Gazette, on May 5, 1853, carried a notice that

"Dr. J. M. Bigelow has returned and will attend to the practice of

his profession. Office at his old residence on Wheeling Street, 3

doors east of Columbus Street." It seems therefore that the offer

from Lieut. Whipple to join the Pacific Railroad expedition came

as something of a surprise.

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328    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

In contrast to the Boundary Survey, there was little con-

fusion connected with the Whipple Expedition.¹⁰ Also, after

twenty-six months in field work with the Boundary Commission

Dr. Bigelow could bring to his new duties the benefit of his ex-

perience. He approached the problems with zest and offered no

complaints. He probably remedied the shortage of drying papers

or other such equipment that he had found lacking previously.

In June, 1853, from the Steamer James Robb on the Mississippi

enroute for Napoleon at the mouth of the Arkansas River, he

wrote Dr. Torrey that he had spent "parts of the 2 or 3 last days

with Dr. Engleman looking over our collecton of Cactaceae and

getting items for more." Here is plain evidence that he was

making a continuing experience of the work of collecting. He

asked Torrey to compare some specimens of the earlier collections:

"Will you please have the kindness to send some of the stem,

spines, flower and fruit to Dr. Engelmann?"

During the course of the journey, Dr. Bigelow was possibly

too busy to write frequently. Only two letters are in existence,

and besides establishing date lines that serve to confirm the trail,

these letters contain little important information. One is marked

Albuquerque, October 29, 1853, in which he says he is preparing

for the long, arduous trip across the Colorado Valley, and the

other is from Sonora, California, May 13, 1854. The expedition

completed its route in Los Angeles. Then, in his own interest,

Dr. Bigelow journeyed by steamer to San Francisco and crossed

the Sacramento Valley to the Sierra Nevada. In July, 1854, he

was back in Washington at work with Lieut. Whipple and the

artist, Baldwin Mollhausen, and others of the members of the ex-

pedition preparing reports.

The Ohio Eagle, July 21, 1854, offers the following summary

of the expedition:

Returned--our esteemed fellow citizen, Dr. John M. Bigelow Physician

10 "The Botany of the Expedition," Report of Explorations and Surveys, House

Executive Documents, 33 Cong., 2 Sess., No. 91, Vol. IV, pt. 5.

No. 1. J. M. Bigelow, "General Description of the Botanical Character of

the Country."

No. 2. J. M. Bigelow, "Description of Forest Trees."

No. 3. George Engelmann or J. M. Bigelow, "Description of Cactaceae."

No. 4. John Torrey, "General Botanical Collections."

No. 5. W. S. Sullivant, "Mosses and Hepatics."

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58                 329

 

and Botanist to Lt. Whipple's Surveying Party spent a few days with his

family last week. He informed us that the party to which he is attached

has run a line from Ft. Smith on the Arkansas to the Pacific at San Diego,

California. This line is on the so called northern route of the contem-

plated Pacific Railroad and is practicable. The company enjoyed excellent

health, losing but one man who wandered off from camp alone, and was no

doubt killed by the Indians. Dr. Bigelow has collected a very extensive

cabinet of Botanical and Geological specimens, and is able from his laborious

research into his department of the expedition to make a full report of the

Botany and Geology of the extensive and interesting country over which he

passed. We shall look with interest for the Doctor's report. Dr. Bigelow

has gone to Washington on business connected with the expedition. It will

be recollected that the Doctor was a Physician and Botanist to the Boundary

Commission under the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo, and acquitted himself

with such credit that his present post was given him unasked.

The above item is quoted as it stands since all the facts may

be substantiated. In all probability it represents as nearly a direct

statement from Bigelow himself as one may hope to find.

The results of the Whipple Expedition gave Dr. Bigelow his

greatest opportunity for scientific writing.   The report is di-

vided into five parts. The first is a general account of the coun-

try, its topography and climate, and contains an elaborate chart

of the elevations at which certain trees are to be found.     This

was pioneering in plant ecology before that science had been sep-

arated from its sister sciences. The second part gave notes on

the trees and their usefulness in supplying timbers for railroad

ties. The third part is a record by Dr. Bigelow and Dr. Engle-

mann of the Cactaceae encountered and collected.       The fourth

part is Dr. Torrey's general list and description of the botanical

collections of ferns and flowering plants. The fifth is Sullivant's

description of the mosses.    These were collected in California

after Dr. Bigelow left the party at San Diego and journeyed on

his own account to San Francisco. Sullivant several times re-

ferred to this as the Musci Bigeloviani.

Since on the Whipple Expedition there was no multiplicity

of collectors the whole report takes on for Bigelow the signifi-

cance of the one-man show for an artist. Here is his best effort.

He had completed his field work. He was fifty years of age. Ex-

tended journeys were no longer on his schedule.

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330    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

With all the account of his activity there are no authentic

photographs of him nor any guide to his personal appearance. The

diary of the artist, Baldwin Mollhausen, furnishes a short but

not entirely adequate description:

It was perceived that Dr. Bigelow, the botanist of the expedition . . .

a general favorite and by far the oldest of the party was not forthcoming.

The aged doctor was a pattern of gentleness and patience always, rejoicing

with those that rejoiced, never wanting when a hearty laugh or a good joke

was to be heard, quite conscious of his own little eccentricities, and quite

willing that others should amuse themselves with them. He was not only

a zealous botanist, but also an enthusiastic sportsman, though it must be

owned that his exertions in the latter department were not as productive of

as much profit as in the former, for he had never yet succeeded in bagging

anything but a rattlesnake and an old hat. The snake, which had rolled

itself up conveniently into a ball, he managed to hit after firing at it only

seven times, and his bullet went through the hat in a triumphant manner,

something having thrown it upon the muzzle of his pistol. To his patients

he was kind and attentive, and of his mule Billy he made an absolute spoiled

child.

There is also evidence of the dangers due to quicksand and from

skirmishes with lurking Indians. Dr. Bigelow left little that was

truly personal.

Dr. Torrey, however, pays his tribute to Bigelow in no un-

certain terms when he speaks of the number of new plants dis-

covered on the Whipple expedition. In July, 1854, Torrey wrote

Gray that he had been examining this material and found a num-

ber of extremely interesting composits and a new Ceanothus. He

mentions again "several good things" and that as to the quality

of the preparations they were "a pleasure to study." He also

comments on the total number of specimens and says that

Bigelow's collection was "twice as large as Beckwith's and Pope's

put together." In the introduction to his part of the Whipple

Reports he states of Bigelow: "His ample collections were brought

home in perfect order. A number of new genera and more than

sixty new species have been discovered by Dr. Bigelow and he has

added much valuable information upon many heretofore imper-

fectly known plants."

About the rest of the period during which Dr. Bigelow lived

in Lancaster. there is little information. It is known he returned

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OHIO MEDICAL HISTORY, 1835-58            331

 

to his medical practice and enjoyed life with his family. In 1855,

1859 and 1860 there are medical notices in Lancaster newspapers,

and as late as 1859 he was still living at the Wheeling Street ad-

dress. In 1860 or 1861 he removed to Detroit where he was

placed in charge of the meteorological department on the northern

and northwestern Great Lakes Survey. How long he remained

in this position is again elusive, for a little later he was professor

of botany and pharmacy in the Detroit Medical College. Before

he left Ohio entirely, however, he may have performed one more

service with lasting consequences. He was a member of a com-

mittee asking that a county asylum be provided for mental cases.

In 1867 he was made a member of the State Medical Society

of Michigan and attended later meetings also. He was, in 1868,

appointed surgeon to the Marine Hospital in Detroit. The Detroit

Review of Medicine, in volumes two and three, contains a lengthy

contribution by Dr. Bigelow. He called it "The Medical Botany,

Topography and Climate, of the Southwestern States and Terri-

tories." In it he discussed the families of plants he knew in the

Southwest. It is a digressive work as the title implies and may

be regarded as a memoir of his exploration.

He also made a new preparation of opium which the writer

has been told was called Svapnia. A notice of the preparation,

without the name, however, appears in volume three of the Detroit

Review of Medicine.

When his long and active career closed in 1878, Dr. Bigelow

was buried from St. Patrick's Cathedral in Detroit. Though no

one now living can find a great deal of a personal nature by which

he may be better known, there are today, as in his own time,

many who may respect his memory through his accomplishments.

The numerous plants named in his honor will serve to recall one

of Ohio's pioneer medical botanists. Perhaps some of his other

discoveries, like guayule, may have at another time some use or

special property not now known and may again serve to call at-

tention to the devoted efforts of the gentle little doctor who could

treat a mule like a spoiled child.

• 19