Since I mentioned Olga....

Photo courtesy UMD website http://www.d.umn.edu/biology/herbarium/

Yesterday I sent admiration for Frances and mentioned Olga.   Like Frances, I met Olga through a book, hers:  The Flora of Northeastern Minnesota.  This was the quintessential local key to identifying plants  while I worked on the Superior National Forest.

One of the first things I did as I Biologist on the Superior National Forest in the late 1970's - early 1980's was to verify past locations of rare plants on the Aurora and Kawishiwi Districts.  I hired another young botanist, Kate and together we got lost in the woods in search of Olga's collections. Many a time, it seemed we were in the exact spot notated on the herbarium specimens.  We would have an Olga seance of sorts, chanting her name and asking for her assistance.  (Almost like my mother would pray "St Francis Dear St Francis come around, somethings lost and cannot be found.")    A fair number of times it worked.

The  University of Minnesota, Duluth website pays tribute to another heroine of mine:


"The herbarium at the University of Minnesota Duluth was founded by Dr. Olga Lakela (1890-1980), a native of Finland who emigrated to northeastern Minnesota as a child. She earned a Ph.D. in botany from the University of Minnesota and was the first Biology Department Head on the Duluth campus. Approximately half of our specimens were collected by Dr. Lakela, and her extensive work in St. Louis and Lake counties, Minnesota is summarized in her book, A Flora of Northeastern Minnesota (1965, University of Minnesota Press). Olga Lakela founded this herbarium in 1935, and the University named it after her in 1960. A bequest from Dr. Lakela supports the maintenance and growth of the collection, as well as botanical research at UMD."

So here is to another great woman of the woods.  Thanks Olga.