Page 118 - Early Naturalists of the Black Range

During 1904 and 1905, Metcalfe made Kingston his headquarters for his collection expedition. It was on July 6, 1904, that he collected the type specimen for the Southwestern Prickly Poppy, Argemone p. pleiacantha.
In the summer of 1904 and spring of 1905, Metcalfe collected several specimens in the southern end of the Black Range, including Acacia constricta paucispina, Antennaria anacleta, Bidens cognata...(the list is rather long and includes Meibomia metcalfei).
Note that many of the specimens collected by Metcalfe were “determined to species” by E. L. Greene. That is the case with the type specimen of Ipomopsis (Callisteris ) aggregata subsp. formosissima, Skyrocket, shown on the previous page. For a more extensive discussion of the collection work done by Metcalfe, in which Greene was the species determiner, see the write up on Edward L. Greene, earlier.
A nice summary of Metcalfe’s collecting history was written by Roalson and Allred, in “A Floristic Study in the Diamond Creek Drainage Area, Gila National Forest, New Mexico” (Aliso: A Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany: Vol. 17: Issue 1, Article 5).
“Metcalfe made important collections in the vicinity of the Gila National Forest primarily between 1903 and 1905 (Standley 1910). In 1903 he collected in the Burro Mountains, at Mangas Springs, and in the Mogollon Mountains. In 1904 and 1905 Metcalfe made his Black Range collection. This included collections at Animas Creek, Hillsboro, Iron Creek, Kingston, and Santa Rita, as well as collections throughout the south end of the Black Range. Around this time he also made collections at Bear Mountain (near Silver City), at Cliff (northwest of Silver City on the Gila River), along the Gila River, and at Silver City (Standley 1910).” (Standley, P. C., 1910, The type localities of plants first described from New Mexico. Contr. U.S. Natl. Herb. 13: 143-227.)
Correspondence from Metcalfe to William Botting Hemsley at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, (dated November 21, 1904) gives some insight into the “collecting business” and the success of Metcalfe as a collector. In that correspondence (Kew summary from their archives):
“Metcalfe hastens to send the missing labels and is sorry to have put Hemsley to trouble. He has not had number 406 determined yet and cannot do it himself. He sent it to Dr E. L. Greene, but has not heard from him yet; he will let Hemsley know the name as soon as he can. Metcalfe has just returned from his season's work collecting in the Black Range, New Mexico. His collection was not much more than half as large as the one he made in the Mogollon Mountains, but he thinks it will be almost as interesting and he hopes to receive an order from RBG Kew for one of the sets. The set will probably contain about 450 numbers arranged and labelled in the same way as his 1903 collection, except that the collecting will be entirely determined by Greene. Greene did his first work near the region Metcalfe collected in this summer and reports that Metcalfe has obtained a number of his types which have
never been described, as well as several new species. Greene has done more work, and and can no doubt do better work, on North Mexico plants than any other man. Metcalfe is offering his Black Range specimens for eight and a half cents each.”
What else do we know about Metcalfe, other than that he was born (1879), collected for a few years in the Black Range, and died in 1936?
Metcalfe received his Bachelor of Science and Masters Degrees from New Mexico Agricultural College (now NMSU). He studied under Elmer Otis Wooton. His bachelor’s thesis was “The Flora of the Mesilla Valley” and his master’s thesis was on soil analysis and tension line in Mesilla Valley between saltbush and creosote bush.
In botanical circles he is known as a plant collector and ecologist. His collection at the National Herbarium was mentioned in Wooton and Standley’s Descriptions of New Plants Preliminary to a Report Upon the Flora of New Mexico (1913).
Following his education he lived in Mangas Springs and Silver City. After the collecting period described here he taught auto mechanics and had an auto business in Silver City. He also worked in mines and was killed in a mining accident in 1936.

John Townsend Sharpless Hunn
During 1903-1905, Hunn collected in and near Silver City. He was an ornithologist. In October 2006 he published “Notes on Birds of Silver City, New Mexico” in The Auk, pp. 418-425), a listing of 112 species. Although his publications were few, he studied bird life in many places in the west and on the east coast. His only time in this area is noted above.

Mrs. J. M. Beals
Plant collector in the Black Range, 1904-1914. Among the specimens she collected, five from Lake Valley are included in the University of Michigan Herbarium (Astrolepis sinuata, Myriopteris fendleri, Myriopteris rufa, Notholaena standleyi, and Pellaea wrightiana (all of these collected in 1904).
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