Charles William Woodworth (April 28, 1865 – November 19, 1940) was an Americanentomologist. He published extensively inentomology and founded the Entomology Department at theUniversity of California, Berkeley. He was the first person to breed themodel organismDrosophila melanogaster (fruit fly) in captivity and to suggest to early genetic researchers atHarvard its use for scientific research.[1] He spent four years at theUniversity of Nanking,China, where he effected the practical control of the city's mosquitoes. He drafted and lobbied for California's firstinsecticide law and administered the law for 12 years. The Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America[2] named its annual career achievement award theC. W. Woodworth Award.[3]
He was born inChampaign, Illinois, on April 28, 1865, to Alvin Oakley Woodworth and Mary Celina (Carpenter) Woodworth.[4] His father was a merchant but died when Charles was four. Some years later, his mother married Alvin's older brother Stephen Elias Woodworth to help raise Charles and his older brother Howard. Stephen had earlier been a resident ofSeneca Falls, New York, and was asignatory of the 1848 Seneca FallsDeclaration of Sentiments.[5]
Charles graduated with aBS in 1885 and anMS in 1886 from theUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The funds received from the judgment in the 1884 U.S. Supreme Court Case,New England Mutual Life Ins. Co. v. Woodworth, may have helped pay for his education. During the period of 1884–1886, he was assistant toS.A. Forbes. From 1886 to 1888 he studied atHarvard University underHermann August Hagen, who, at the time, was the leading entomologist of the U.S. He returned between 1900 and 1901 and worked underWilliam E. Castle.[6] In 1888, he was appointed entomologist andbotanist at theUniversity of Arkansas's Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station.[7] On September 4, 1889, he married Leonora Stern inRolla, Missouri, the city where her parents, Edward Stern and Lizzie Hardin Evans Stern, lived. Charles suffered from successive attacks ofmalaria while inArkansas. He left there in 1891 to become assistant in entomology at theUniversity of California (now UC Berkeley) where he founded and built up the Division of Entomology.[8] He also participated in the development of the Agricultural Experiment Station, now known asUC Davis, and is also considered the founder of the Entomology Department there.[9]
At Berkeley, he rose to be Assistant Professor in 1891, Associate Professor in 1904, Professor in 1913, and was namedEmeritus Professor upon his retirement in 1930.[10]
Woodworth is credited with first breedingDrosophila in quantity while he was at Harvard.Thomas Hunt Morgan'sNobel Prize biography says that Woodworth suggested toWilliam E. Castle that Drosophila might be used for genetical work.[11] Castle and his associates used it for their work on the effects of inbreeding, and through them F. E. Lutz became interested in it and the latter introduced it to Morgan, who was looking for a species that could be bred in the very limited space at his command.[12]
While on sabbatical leave in 1918, he was a lecturer at theUniversity of Nanking and honorary professor of entomology at theNational Southeastern University atNanking, China. During his year there he effected a practical control of mosquitoes for the first time in that city's history. He returned for a three-year period in 1921–1924. During this period he organized the Kiangsu Provincial Bureau of Entomology as well as many other things. In the words of the president of the University of Nanking, "He served China in a magnificent way."[13]
His publications were very extensive and included nearly every field of entomology.[14] A few of his most outstanding works are: "A List of the Insects of California (1903), The Wing Veins of Insects" (1906), "Guide to California Insects" (1913),[15] and "School of Fumigation" (1915). He was the first editor and first contributor to the University of California Publications in Entomology.
He had much to do with the responsible use of pesticides. He proposed and drafted the first California Insecticide Law in 1906, was largely instrumental in securing its passage in 1911, and administered the law until July 1, 1923.[16] Entomological campaigns which he conducted in California concerned thecodling moth, the peach twig-borer, citrus insects,grasshoppers, and citruswhite fly eradication.
Charles and Leonora had four children: Lawrence, Harold, Charles, and Elizabeth. His son,Dr. Charles E. Woodworth, also became an entomologist; he worked for theUSDAARS focusing on thewireworm and served as an entomologist with theArmy in the Pacific duringWorld War II with the rank of Major, commanding a unit which cleared swamps.[17]
Their home at 2237 Carleton Street inBerkeley, that he designed, was designated a Berkeley Landmark in 1993.[18][19] He had many avocations including making telescopes,[20] analyzing chess positions, and researching his extended family's genealogy.
C.W. was an 1889 charter member of the American Association of Economic Entomologists (an association which merged with theEntomological Society of America,[21] founded 1906, in 1953). The Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America selects a member of the society to win theC. W. Woodworth Award based on "outstanding accomplishments in entomology over at least the past 10 years."[22] Here is a nearly completelist of winners since 1969. This award is principally sponsored by his great-grandson, Brian Holden,[23] and his wife, Joann Wilfert, with additional support byDr. Craig and Kathryn Holden, and Dr. Jim and Betty Woodworth.
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