May 22: Father of American Beekeeping

L.L. Langstroth
b. 1810 (Philadelphia) - d. 1895 (Dayton)

I recently stumbled upon a fascinating biography of Langstroth (The Life of Langstroth by Florence Naille, 1942). Despite being "prostrated" (completely disabled) by "head trouble" and "nervous malady" (obviously depression) half of his life, Langstroth's contributions to beekeeping made commercial beekeeping possible. Our ready access to honey is in no small part due to his discoveries. He:

• Identified "bee space" (3/8")
• Invented the moveable frame, stackable hive (the style of hives you see in my pictures)
• Imported and propagated the Italian bee in the U.S.
  
• Wrote a seminal book on beekeeping called The Hive and the Honey-Bee (1853)

He also was a well-respected minister, abolitionist, and lived in Oxford, Ohio for many years. He's buried in Woodland Cemetery in Dayton. Unfortunately, he was a bad businessman, got screwed over with patent infringements, and barely made any money off of his invention. He had trouble holding down a job because of his illness, and his family survived financially through the generosity of brothers-in-law and friends. Incidentally, his great-grandson was an astrophysicist and co-discoverer of the neutrino.