In memoriam

William Thomas Frankenberger

ASA and SSSA Fellow Dr. William Thomas Frankenberger, Jr. (Bill), age 69 of Stevensville, MT, passed away suddenly on 14 Aug. 2021. He was born in Topeka, KS on 3 Apr. 1952. As a teenager, he worked in his father’s grocery store and excelled in high school track. After graduating high school, he received a track scholarship in pole vaulting at Emporia State University where he graduated in 1974 with a B.A. degree in Biology. He then attended Iowa State University in 1975 and received a master’s degree (1977) and Ph.D. (1980) in the Department of Agronomy.

After graduation, Frankenberger joined the faculty at University of California–Riverside. His research interests included agronomic and environmental microbiology with an emphasis on microbial production of plant hormones, microbial transformations of oxyanions, and bioremediation of hazardous chemicals. He taught undergraduate soil science and worked with numerous graduate students and postdocs, training and mentoring them in environmental research. He retired in 2011 as a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Soil Microbiology and Biochemistry.

Frankenberger accomplished many professional milestones and was recognized nationally and internationally for his work. In addition to ASA and SSSA, he was a Fellow of ASM, AAAS, and AIC. He was the recipient of the highest honor in Environmental Protection from the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture (1995) for developing an innovative bioremediation technology for permanent, cost-effective, and safe cleanup of selenium in the environment. In 1988, he filed a patent to remove selenium via microbial detoxification from contaminated sediments at Kesterson Reservoir in central California. This innovation persuaded the U.S. government to change its plans to create a capped landfill over the Superfund site at the reservoir and instead use Frankenberger’s intrinsic bioremediation method on the dewatered sediments at the 1,200-acre site. Since then, federal and state regulatory agencies have adopted intrinsic bioremediation as a viable option in remediation of hundreds of sites containing other hazardous chemicals including solvents, pesticides, and petroleum products.

During his career, Frankenberger published 240 journal articles and authored or edited eight books. He was also an entrepreneur. He established two environmental companies during the 1990s: Center for Environmental Microbiology and Centrum Analytical. These laboratories conducted soil studies and analyses, utilizing his innovative mobile laboratory vans, to diagnosis type and extent of contamination on site for governmental agencies and private companies charged with cleaning up contaminated sites.

Frankenberger so deeply cared about the environment and because of his desire to reach into the future and beyond his lifetime, he and his wife, Margaret, established an Endowed Faculty Professorship in Soil Science at Iowa State University (ISU) in the Department of Agronomy in 2015. The endowed professorship is awarded for a period of time by ISU to one outstanding professor and researcher in agronomy and will continue to be awarded indefinitely into the future. The current recipient has already made outstanding contributions that improve methods for sustainable farming.

Frankenberger was a caring, loving, generous, and spiritual man who will be missed. He is survived by his wife, Margaret Beebe-Frankenberger; his brothers, Tim (Lisa), Tucson AZ, and Jeff (Debbie), Bend OR; and his sister Roxanne Hess (Kansas City, MO); two sons, Grant (Riverside, CA) and Spencer (Lake Havasu, AZ); a step-daughter, Melanie Nagle (Mike), Stevensville, MT; and four grandchildren, one great-grandchild, three nephews, and one niece.

John Read

ASA Fellow John Read was born 1 Dec. 1954 in Elko, NV and passed from this life 26 Oct. 2021. He was a Research Agronomist with USDA-ARS in the Crop Science Research Laboratory at Mississippi State, MS. He worked for 29 years with USDA-ARS and also spent two years conducting research in Australia. He also held an adjunct faculty position with Mississippi State University. He received a M.S. from the University of Nevada–Reno and a Ph.D. from Oklahoma State University.

Dr. Read was responsible for investigating the impact of agronomic approaches that improve the productivity, quality, and nutrient use of major southern crops. He is internationally recognized as an authority on physiological adaptations to drought, on the safe and effective management of manure nutrients, and on forage production systems for both the humid southern and temperate western regions of the United States.

Read is the author or co-author of 75 refereed journal articles and two book chapters. He was an ASA member for 37 years and CSSA member for 32 years and provided leadership for several organizations, serving ASA and CSSA as a member, community leader (Soil-Plant-Water Relations Community), and an associate editor for Crop, Forage & Turfgrass Management and Forage and Grazinglands. He also served on several ASA and CSSA committees.

Read spent years involved in the Boy Scouts with his son and was recognized for his leadership and interest in the local organization. He is preceded in death by his parents, Jake and Peggy, and by two brothers, Derek David and Bruce Hankerson. He is survived by his wife, Lisa; children, Charlotte Hughes (Jonathan of Plano, TX), USMC Corporal Tim Read (Anh of Wesley Chapel, FL), Colleen Warren (TJ of West Point, MS), Leandra Moschetti of Wells, NV; grandchildren, Juliane Hughes, Aria Mitchell, John Mitchell, James Mitchell; brother, Peter Read (Wendy) of Lafayette, CA; sisters, Madelyn (Phil Brittenham) of Sparks, NV, and Margaret Read of Sacramento, CA; and a number of adoring nieces and nephews.