Protecting Plants, People and the World: Celebrating Ohio State’s Commitment to Plant Health is on view at OSU’s Thompson Library Gallery through Sunday, August 7, 2022. Items from many of the OSU special collections are on view to illustrate OSU’s long history of people in plant sciences who are working to create a sustainable Earth through healthy plants.
Curated by award-winning OSU faculty members Florian Diekmann and Monica M. Lewankdowski, this exhibit features artifacts including prints, notebooks, and many specimens from the special collections at OSU.
Plant diseases and pests cause over 40% losses in food crops yearly. This exhibit shows specimen insects and examples of their damage to food crops and forests. OSU scientists also research forest health and soil issues. Plant parasites have been studied at OSU since 1873. One of the first master’s degrees at OSU was given to a woman, Frederica Detmers, for her studies of fungi in 1891. Items honoring her and other early botanists are in the East wall showcase.
There is a row of excellent botanical prints from the collection of Dr. Emanuel Rudolph who was a beloved biology professor at OSU from 1961 until his death in 1992. He and his wife, Ann Rudolph, willed a collection of over 53,000 volumes to OSU covering 500 years of plant history. The Chadwick Arboretum hopes to create a traveling exhibit of botanical prints and books for public gardens and museums to exhibit in the future.
The Ohio State University’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences (CFAES) has 22 undergraduate degree granting programs including plant pathology and food science. Also, OSU is one of the few universities with a master’s degree in turfgrass management.
Protecting Plants, People and the World is on view through August 7, 2022 at Ohio State University’s Thompson Library Gallery. For information on gallery hours, parking and other items, visit library.osu.edu.