In memoriam

Charles N. Bollich

Dr. Charlie Bollich, a research agronomist and member of ASA and CSSA for 42 years, passed away on 16 June 2022 in Beaumont, TX at the age of 95. He was born on 9 Sept. 1926 in Mowata, LA, and he served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. His entire career was with the USDA-ARS in rice breeding, which began in Crowley, LA, but more than 25 years were spent as the Research Leader at the Rice Research Unit, in Beaumont.

Bollich developed 20 rice varieties that were grown extensively along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast. ‘Bluebelle’ rice (1965) was considered the standard for grain quality for many years. Labelle (1972) was an early maturing variety that was grown for more than 15 years. ‘Newrex’ (1979) was the first rice variety developed for the parboiling industry. Rice varieties were also developed for the medium-grain and aromatic markets. He is best known for the development of ‘Lemont’ (1983), a semidwarf variety that transformed rice production in the Southern USA. This short-statured variety allowed higher nitrogen rates to be applied, which increased yields some 20% and also provided “biological insurance” from lodging.

Bollich received many prestigious awards, including Fellow of ASA and CSSA. He still had time for his “first love in science”—archeology—and he served as president of the Texas Archeological Society and as a member of the Louisiana Archeological Society. He was considered an expert on the pottery of Southeast Texas and Louisiana. The Museum of the Gulf Coast in Port Arthur is home to some select pieces of his archeological findings.

Bollich is preceded in death by his parents; wife of 49 years, Peggy Bollich; and five brothers and three sisters. He is survived by his two sons and their families. He is fondly remembered as a man of short stature, who cast a long shadow.

John Robert Stottlemyer

John Robert (Bob) Stottlemyer, an ASA and SSSA member for 37 years, died of natural causes on 31 May 2022 while on a research expedition at a remote field site along the Agashashok River in northern Alaska. He is survived by his life partner of 43 years, Carla del Mar, and his sister Laura. His three decades of research at this site were just a small part of his remarkable career in studying environmental issues in northern landscapes and his incredibly full life.

Stottlemyer was born in Hagerstown, MD on 19 June 1940. He majored in Forestry at Pennsylvania State University with summer jobs fighting wildfires in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California and working as an interpreter in national parks. He received a Ph.D. in Forest Ecology at Duke University, under the supervision of Professor Bill Ralston, focusing on forest soils and water quality. His Ph.D. research at the Fraser Experimental Forest in the Colorado Rockies was one of the first to combine the hydrology of mountain streams with water quality and nutrient budgets, an approach that persisted in his research, providing some of the best long-term records of forests and streams in the world. After graduating from Duke, he voyaged the world as a professor with Semester at Sea (then called World Campus Afloat) and later joined the White House Council on Environmental Quality. After this, he became the lead environmental scientist in the Washington Office of the National Park Service (NPS) and then served as the Regional Chief Scientist for the Philadelphia Office of NPS. He later relocated within the NPS to Houghton, MI, beginning decades of collaboration with Michigan Technological University. He focused on hydrology, chemistry, and processes influencing water quality in remote watersheds.

Stottlemyer influenced the lives and careers of many colleagues, post-doctoral scientists, and students. His legacy also includes a vast trove of professional photographs documenting the beauty of wild landscapes and some of the changes that have developed through his long life.