Duggar, Benjamin Minge

(b. Gallion, Alabama, 1 September 1872; d. New Haven, Connecticut, 10 September 1956)

plant pathology.

The fourth of six sons of a country practitioner, Duggar entered the University of Alabama shortly before his fifteenth birthday, but a compelling interest in agricultural science led him to transfer after two years to the Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Mississippi State College). Shortly after graduation (1891) Duggar found a sympathetic mentor in George F. Atkinson at Alabama Polytechnic Institute, where he served one year as assistant in mycology and plant physiology and received his M.Sc. for the carefully documented thesis “Germination of Teleutospores of Ravenelia Cassiaecola.” He spent an additional year as assistant director of the Agricultural Experiment Station at Uniontown, Alabama, before transferring to Harvard. Here, from 1893 to 1895, he worked under W. G. Farlow and Roland Thaxter, taught botany at Radcliffe, and completed required courses in the humanities that finally brought him a highly cherished Harvard M.A. After another year of fieldwork—this one concerned with the wheat-devastating chinch bug in Illinois—Duggar rejoined Atkinson, at Cornell. Here he concentrated on chemistry and fungus spore germination and completed the work required for the Ph.D.

Traveling in Europe for a year (1899–1900) Duggar studied with such eminent authorities as Wilhelm Pfeffer at Leipzig and Georg Klebs and Julius Küihn, both at Halle. Returning to America, he spent one year as plant physiologist with the Bureau of Plant Industry of the U. S. Department of Agriculture. There he developed a lasting interest in cotton diseases and mushroom culture. While continuing to serve as consultant to the bureau, Duggar accepted his first major educational post, as professor of botany and head of the department at the University of Missouri (1902). For an exhibit of mushrooms and other fungi he was awarded a grand prize at the St. Louis Fair (1904). Another foreign tour (1905–1906) took him first to Munich, where he worked with Karl von Goebel at the Botanical Institute, and later to Bonn, Montpellier, and Algiers. Returning to Cornell as professor of plant physiology, Duggar completed two major works: Fungus Diseases of Plants (New York, 1909), the first monograph in any language devoted exclusively to the subject of plant pathology, which remained a standard text for many years, and Plant Physiology With Special Reference to Plant Production (New York, 1911).

Duggar next returned to Missouri as research professor of plant physiology at Washington University and director of the Missouri Botanical Garden. Studies of this period include those on red pigment formation in the tomato, enzymes in red algae, nitrogen fixation, and methods for determining hydrogen concentration in biological fluids. During World War I, Duggar contributed valuable data on the salt requirements of higher plants. He later (1920) turned his attention to the serious problem of the tobacco mosaic virus, becoming a leading investigator in this field.

After fifteen years at Washington University, Duggar accepted his last university assignment, the professorship of plant physiology and economic botany at the University of Wisconsin, a post he held from 1927 to 1943, when he retired emeritus. But the most rewarding period of his career was yet to come. During World War II he served as adviser to the National Economic Council, and in 1944 he accepted a position as consultant in mycological research with the Lederle Division of the American Cyanamid Company. After a short period devoted to the investigation of antimalarial drugs, Duggar turned his attention to the quest for new antibiotic-producing organisms. A three-year study of Streptomyces aureofaciens led to the introduction of chlortetracycline (Aureomycin) (1948), another milestone in the story of man’s attempt to conquer pathogenic bacteria.

Duggar, a man of great enthusiasm and physical vitality, played a dynamic role in organizing plant scientists in America. A founder of the American Society of Agronomy (1907) and the American Phytopathological Society (1908), he was also active in the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society of Naturalists, the American Botanical Society (president, 1923), and the American Society of Plant Physiologists (president, 1947). A voluminous writer, he also was editor of several important publications, including Proceedings of the International Congress of Plant Sciences (1926); Biological Effects of Radiation (1936), for which he wrote a chapter, “Effects of Radiation on Bacteria,”; and Botanical Abstracts for Physiology (1917–1926). When the latter publication was absorbed by Biological Abstracts, he continued as editor of the plant physiology section (1926–1933).

Among the many honors bestowed on Duggar were membership in the American Philosophical Society (1921) and the National Academy of Sciences (1927), as well as honorary degrees from Missouri (LL.D., 1944), Washington (Sc.D., 1953), and Wisconsin (D.Sc., 1956). A modest individual, although always a perfectionist, Duggar enjoyed many aspects of life to the fullest. His marriage in 1901 to Marie L. Robertson (d. 1922) produced two sons and three daughters. A second marriage to Elsie Rist (1927) produced one daughter.

As a scientist Duggar helped to advance research in his chosen field from the era of morphology to the modern period, with its emphasis on physiology. Certainly his pioneer work of 1909 has already won a secure place among the classics of American science, and the discovery of Aureomycin assures Duggar an honored position in the history of medicine.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

A biography is J. C. Walker, “Benjamin Minge Duggar,” in Biographical Memoirs. National Academy of Sciences, 32 (1958), 113–131, with bibliography and photograph.

See also “Benjamin Minge Duggar,” in Current Biography 1952 (1953), pp. 166–169.

Morris H. Saffron