This is a Colorado grasshopper. Bill took the picture of this green hopper because I told him I was going through a dry period and had nothing to blog about and nothing new to photograph. He carefully placed the large insect on a volunteer sunflower in the back yard for more interest. Isn't he just the best?! (Bill - not the grasshopper!)The grasshopper reminded me of my father. Daddy did his Ph.D. thesis on grasshoppers - but before he had the chance to present it, there was a fire and all his hard work and research was destroyed - all but this pen & ink illustration. Daddy was a meticulous draftsman.
In order to complete his doctorate, Daddy needed to duplicate all his work. Since he didn't want to do the same research twice, he selected a completely different topic.
This picture of my father was taken around 1914, the beginning of WWI. He was 25 years old and had been teaching zoology at Colorado College here in Colorado Springs since he graduated from the University of Michigan. Sometimes when I walk around downtown, on the CC campus, or hike in the mountains, I wonder what it must have been like 100 years ago when he lived here. I wonder if I'm walking where he once walked, or looking at the same view he had outside his classroom. I wish I'd known him better.
After the war, Dr. Horace Burrington Baker (HB to his friends) relocated to Philadelphia to teach zoology at the University of Pennsylvania. He didn't meet my mother until 1941 at the age of 52.
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