Illinois Natural History Survey Reports

              1
I LLINOIS
NATURAL
HI STORY
S U R V E Y R e p o r t s
July/
August 1998
No. 352
I N S I D E Illinois Natural History Survey is 140 Years
Grassland Habitats in
Illinois
3
Ecological Numeracy
4
Improved Soybean In-sect
Research Database
5
New INHS Publications
Catalog
5
Species Spotlight:
Walking Stick
6
The Naturalist's
Apprentice:
Insects and Their Young
7
Continued on page 2
On June 30, 1998, the Illinois
Natural History Survey became
140 years old. With a staff of 370
and an average of 120 scientifi c
publications each year, the Survey
is the largest and most successful
of the state biological surveys in
this country.
The foundation for what
would become the Illinois Natu-ral
History Survey was laid by
Cyrus Thomas, a lawyer, teacher,
and self-taught entomologist
from Jackson County. In a De-cember
1857 meeting of the State
Teachers' Association in Decatur,
Thomas proposed that a Natural
History Society of Illinois be
formed. On June 30, 1858, the
Natural History Society, parent
organization of the Illinois Natu-ral
History Survey, was offi cially
organized at Illinois State Normal
University in Bloomington (now
Illinois State University at Nor-mal).
The Natural History Society
was legally chartered
by the state leg-islature
on
February 22,
1861. In the
original char-ter,
the Society
was given the
dual purpose of
preparing
“a scientifi c survey of the State of
Illinois in all the departments of
natural history” and of establish-ing
a museum of natural history at
Illinois State Normal University.
In 1877, the General Assem-bly
established a Natural History
Museum at Springfi eld, and the
Natural History Society Museum
at Illinois State Normal University
was renamed the State Labora-tory
of Natural History. The act
that established the State Labora-tory
of Natural History enabled
the institution to concentrate on
research rather than on museum
exhibits. Stephen A. Forbes, who
had been appointed curator of
the museum in 1872, was named
director of the new State Labora-tory
of Natural History in 1877. In
1882, Forbes took on additional
duties when he succeeded Cyrus
Thomas as state entomologist.
In 1885, Forbes moved from
Illinois State Normal University
to the Illinois Industrial Univer-sity
at Urbana, which that same
year was renamed the University
of Illinois. With the approval of
the state legislature, Forbes trans-ferred
the State Laboratory
of Natural History and its staff,
library, and research collections,
which by that time were quite
large, with him to Urbana.
In 1917, the research functions
of the State Laboratory of Natural
History and those of the Offi ce
of the State Entomologist were
consolidated under the name Illi-nois
Natural History Survey with
Forbes as its fi rst chief. The new
Survey was incorporated into
the Department of Registration
and Education with the other two
state scientifi c surveys, the State
Stephen A.
Forbes, Civil
War veteran
and fi rst Chief
of the Illinois
Natural History
Survey.
Original building of Illinois State Normal University at Normal where the
Illinois Natural History Survey was founded and housed until 1884.
Picture from INHS image archives
Picture from INHS image archives