The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock
The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock
The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock
The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock
The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock
The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock

The Comstocks of Cornell--The Definitive Autobiography by Anna Botsford Comstock

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The Comstocks of Cornell is the autobiography written by the naturalist educator Anna Botsford Comstock about her life and that of her husband, the entomologist John Henry Comstock--both prominent figures in the scientific community and in Cornell University history.

A first edition was published in 1953, but it omitted key Cornellians, historical anecdotes, and personal insights. In this twenty-first-century edition, Karen Penders St. Clair restores the author's voice by reconstructing the entire manuscript as Anna Comstock wrote it--and thereby preserves Comstock's memories of the personal and professional lives of the couple as she originally intended. The book includes an epilogue documenting the Comstocks' last years and fills in gaps from the 1953 edition. Described as serious legacy work, this book is an essential part of the history of both Cornell University and its press.

Table of Contents:

1. The Boyhood of John Henry Comstock, 1849-1865
2. A Sailor and a Scholar
3. Undergraduate Days at Cornell, 1870-1874
4. Anna Botsford-Childhood and Girlhood
5. A University Professorship and Marriage, 1876-1879
6. Entomologist to U.S. Department of Agriculture (Life in Washington as United States Entomologist, 1879-1881)
7. Return to Cornell
8. The Year 1888-1889; With a Winter in Germany
9. California and Stanford University
10. The Nature Study Movement at Cornell University; A Journey South to Study Spiders
11. How to Know Butterflies and the Confessions to a Heathen Idol
12. A Sabbatical Year Abroad-Egypt and Greece
13. Italy, Switzerland, and Home
14. Chapter 15: 1908-1912, Cornell's New Quarters for Entomology and Nature Study
15. The Two hundred and Fiftieth-anniversary Celebration of the Royal Society and The International Entomological Congress
16. The 65th Milestone and Retirement
17. Florida and Retirement
18. The Toronto Meeting of the A.A.A.S. 1922. A surprising election and voyage westward.
19. Honolulu and Happiness, A Voyage to Europe
20. Mentone
Editor's Epilogue

"Anna Botsford Comstock's voice has been returned to her in this carefully edited and amended edition of her memoir of her husband John Comstock, her observations of life around her, and of Cornell University during its early days. Anna Comstock was Cornell student, scientific illustrator, wife, mother of Nature Studies, Cornell faculty woman, and one of the three most admired female citizens of the world she inhabited. Her words return us to a different world and are worth attending."


Karen Penders St. Clair's masterful recovery of Anna Botsford Comstock's personal voice corrects a historical injustice. It also bestows a gift to us all as we hear and learn from a woman of great warmth and wisdom in her full humanity.  --Scott J. Peters, Cornell University


Anna Botsford Comstock's voice has been returned to her in this carefully edited and amended edition of her memoir of her husband John Comstock, her observations of life around her, and of Cornell University during its early days. Anna Comstock was Cornell student, scientific illustrator, wife, mother of Nature Studies, Cornell faculty woman, and one of the three most admired female citizens of the world she inhabited. Her words return us to a different world and are worth attending.  --Carol Kammen, Tompkins County Historian

Currently an independent scholar based in Rochester, New York, St. Clair hopes the upcoming volume will give readers a better sense of what Anna was truly like, beyond the familiar tropes of her status as Cornell's first female professor, a leading scientific illustrator, and an early advocate of nature education.  -- "Cornell Alumni Magazine"

Karen Penders St. Clair is an independent researcher and holds a position in the School of Integrated Plant Science and Horticulture at Cornell University.

Comstock Publishing

hardcover Pub Date: April 15, 2020 / 1.4" H x 9.1" L x 6.4" W  / 560 pages

paperback Pub Date: August 15, 2019 / 0.7" H x 9.0" L x 6.0" W / 312 pages