Begin Page 1. The Wisconsin Pathogen Newsletter University of Wisconsin, College of Agriculture, Department of Plant Pathology Madison, Wisconsin R.E. Vaughan, Editor February 23, 1939 Hello Wisconsinites! A lot of water has passed under the bridge since the last edition of the Pathogen, and many news items of interest have occurred. We'd like to mention them all but that is impossible if this letter is to be kept within reading length. "What do you hear from Dr. Jones?" is the first question to answer. We had a card recently from Dr. and Mrs. Jones in Guatemala. They sailed from New Orleans on January 17 to be away from the States about a month. The country is reported delightful, and they are well and happy. Their summer was spent on the Clark Acres, Brookfield, Vermont. Their home is a typical old New England farm house loaded with authentic antiques. You may remember that Doctor Jones is a faithful Rotarian, and from Brookfield he can attend meetings in Randolph, Barre, Northfield, and the capitol city , Montpelier. The F. R. Jones family, the Rikers, and the Vaugh.ans stopped at Brookfield for little visits during the past summer. These were much enjoyed by all concerned. If any of you get within driving distance of Brookfield during the summer months, be sure and stop. The permanent staff at Madison is just about as usual except that Dr. Keitt has been confined to his home by an attack of thrombosis, followed by an embolism that lodged in the lung. He is much improved now and is at his desk a part of the time. He has recently forwarded the final page proof of the Provost translation to the printer. This work should soon be available as Phytopathological Classics No. 6. He and his co-workers are giving special attention to sexuality and heritable variability, in the apple and pear scab fungi. The possibilities of adapting eradicant fungicides to combat pathogens of the apple scab type continue to intrigue us. New chemicals are adding interest to the work. Dr. Walker is breathing a little easier now that the first semester is over. He was in charge of Course 101, which was taken by 35 undergraduates and 11 graduate students. It proved too much of a good thing with his direction of research in disease of potatoes and truck crops, so next year he will be relieved of the undergraduate work. A new course for undergraduates will be offered by Doctors Riker, Dickson and staff. Dean Baldwin reports that we may have double the registration of this year on account of the greatly increased enrollment in the College of Agriculture. Walker attended the potato conference in Eaton Rouge, Louisiana, and made a trip to Washington in the interests of his vegetable disease research projects. His most fascinating work of the past year has been that on boron deficiency studies in connection with blackspot in canning beets. This phase of his research has beon presented before the state and national canners' associations. His associate Dr. R. H. Larson is working with hiring on potato diseases, principally yellow dwarf, sprain and scab. Dr, Whipple has charge of the field laboratory at Kenosha. A new building has been provided thru W. P. A. assistance on the Petrified Springs County Park Farm. It will be used jointly by Entomology and Plant Pathology. The Walkers took a vacation trip into Mexico last year. End Page 1. Begin Page 2. Dr. Dickson is pushing the research work on malting qualities of barley samples from a wide variety of sources and a lot of new disease resistant hybrid strains that have been producced in coop0ration with the Agronomy Department. Over 20 men are working in the barley and malt research laboratories in the Agronomy Building. Some industrial fellowship funds and W. P. A. funds are being used. His brother, Dr. Allan Dickson, is in charge of the chemical work; Dickson has discussed barley disease and malting problems before maltsters' and brewers' conventions and meetings of grain elevator men. One trip took him to Washington, D. C. to talk over plans with the newly reorganized United States Department of Agriculture. Dr. Riker is continuing work on crown gall research in cooperation with colleagues in Bacteriology, Biochemistry and Plant Physiology. He has acquired “growth hormone” technique from Dr. Went at the California Institute of Technology, a technique which is applicable to various phases of the work. A review of these investigations was given in an invitation paper at the Richmond meetings. With the help of various colleagues and the State Conservation Department, Riker is considering various forest disease problems, which are looming large in relation to the state and federal reforestation programs in Wisconsin. Riker’s course in methods of plant pathology research takes top rank with all our graduate students. His notes on this course have been published. John Brann and I continue with the extension work with the exception of short course teaching. This last year I had 112 in class, and had to move out of the laboratory down into the agronomy lecture room. John took on the potato growing group in the horticultural class. We have just had a lot of contacts at the annual Farm and Home Week. In the field I have attended a lot of meetings with George Briggs, Agronomy, on grain improvement, including grain seed treatment with the new type of gravity treater. A truck growers' school was held at Racine in January that pleased the group very much. Clayton and Carpenter, two of Dr. Keitt’s graduate students in charge of fruit disease laboratories in Sturgeon Bay and Gays Mills , took on the extension lectures at the State Horticultural Society meeting. Dr. James Johnson is continuing his active interest in plant viruses and tobacco diseases. Dr. W. B. Allington, Agent , U. S. D. A., is assisting on the brown root-rot disease of tobacco, and Bill Ogden has charge of the tobacco field plots. While listed under Horticulture, Professor Jones R. always considers Jim a close ally. Dr. F. R. Jones, with the United States Department of Agriculture, continues his researches on alfalfa diseases and has taken on the sweet clover disease project. He is working with Dr. Brink, Genetics, on the development of resistant strains and has a lot of seedlings and cuttings growing in the greenhouse. Dr. Oliver Smith is also with the United States Department of Agriculture forage crop office and is working on clover diseases. The United States Department of Agriculture cereal disease workers, whom we always include in thinking of our Wisconsin croup, are Miss Johann and Paul Hoppe, working on corn diseases, and R. G. Shands in connection with barley improvement thru breeding and selection for disease resistance. H. L. Shands, in Agronomy, is working in close cooperation with the cereal disease group on oats, barley and wheat. He also takes a couple of sections in short course Agronomy. End Page 2. Begin Page 3. The former vegetable and fruit disease laboratories on the third floor Agronomy Building have been reassigned to permit greater efficiency in use of space. The library is located where the vegetable disease laboratory used to be, and the old fruit laboratory is a research laboratory. The old library room on second floor is now a research laboratory. The new arrangement is working out to our mutual satisfaction. One of the big urges was to get the library up near the classroom where it would be more accessible for student use. Half of the old lecture room on third floor Horticulture Building has been turned into a supply and washroom, and the balance refitted for a studio and dark roan for Gene Herrling. He has general charge of supplies , and is responsible for the fine technical work on slides, photos and graphs that come from our department. To do all this moving we have called heavily on W. P. A. labor. Considerable of this type of labor is also being used by Al. Steinmetz in routine jobs in the greenhouses. An additional greenhouse unit, completing the east range, is almost ready for some expansion in potato and grass breeding work. There are 25 graduate students with projects in plant pathology. Cooperating departments include Botany, Biochemistry, Genetics , Agronomy, Soils and Horticulture. The students are: Alvarez-Garcia, Luis, Porto Rico Agricultural Experiment Station. Bever, Wayne M., Assistant Pathologist , U. S, D. A. , Moscow, Idaho. Carpenter , John B., University of Idaho , Moscow. Clayton, Carlyle N., Clemson Agricultural College , South Carolina. Coe, Donald M., State College , Pullman, Washington. Edwards, Eric T., Assistant Biologist , Department of Agriculture, Sydney , New South Wales, A Commonwealth Fellow. Felton, Mat W., University of Wisconsin , Madison, Dane County. Fulton, Robert W., Wabash College, Indiana. Gruenhagen, Richard H., University of Minnesota, St. Paul. Henry, Berch, University of West Virginia, Morgantown. Jolivette, James P., University of Wisconsin, La Crosse County. Josephson, Leonard M., University of Wisconsin, Bayfield County. Langford, Michael H., Clemson Agricultural College, South Carolina. LeBeau, Francis J., Louisiana State University , Baton Rouge. Martin, J . Foster, Assistant Agronomist, U. s. D. A., Pendleton, Oregon. McIntire, Floyd C., Brigham Young University , Utah, McLean , John G., University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Newton, R, Kenneth, Wake Forest College , North Carolina. Pryor , Dean E., University of California, Berkeley. Roth , Lewis F ., Miami University, Ohio. Schroeder, Wilbur T., University of Idaho , Moscow. Smith, Paul G., University of California, Berkeley. Stahmann, Mark A., Brigham Young University , Utah. Stevenson, Elmer C., University of Maryland , College Park. Van Lanen, James M., University of Wisconsin, Oconto County . Space limitations prevent mentioning all the recent marriages, etc. In early winter the department lost by death two strong friends and supporters, i.e., W. J. Hansche, Racine, and Peter C. Swartz, Waukesha. Mr. Hansche was well past 70, but Mr. Swartz succumbed to an attack of pneumonia in the prime of life. He was only 56. End Page 3. Begin Page 4. C. R. Orton , the first assistant of Dr. Jones, whom he brought with him from Vermont in 1909, has recently been made Director of the West Virginia Experiment Station. Johanna C. Went, who was with us for a year on a Netherland American Fellowship , is now associated with Dr. Westerdijk, working on the Dutch Elm disease project. E. M. Hildebrand , Cornell University, Ithaca., New York, won a prize from the Association of Agriculture Experiment Stations for the best technical publication of 1937. Title: The Blossom Blight Phase of Fire Blight and Methods of Control. H. R. Angell, Division of Plant Industry, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, Canberra, Australia, has recently been cited by King George of England for his good work on tobacco downy mildew investigations and admitted to the Order of the British Empire. He is the first plant pathologist of Australia to receive this citation, which is given only for distinguished public service and takes precedence over all other degrees and honors. Some recent changes in address: Ivanoff , Spas S., Plant Pathology , Branch Experiment Station, Winter Haven, Texas. Locke, Seth B., Fruit Disease Investigation, Agricultural Experiment Station, Fayetteville, Arkansas. Bowman, Donald H., U. S. D. A. Cereal Office on Corn Disease Investigations , Wooster, Ohio. Ullstrup, Arnold J., U. S, D. A. Cereal Office Corn Disease Investigations, Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana. Virgin, Walter J., Truck Disease Investigation, Agricultural Experiment Station , Moscow, Idaho. Wei, O. T., University of Nanking, c/o West China Union Universities , Cheng-tu , Szechwan, China (via French Indo-China). Halperin, Leonardo, Division do Fitopathologie, Ministerio de Agricultura, P. Colon 974, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Final: We shall be delighted to get your reply, and will not wait so long before issuing another number of the Pathogen. End Page 4.