This timeline follows the documented history of local mycology—from early specimen records and regional inventories to RAMA’s community learning and conservation work. Dates are labeled carefully where the public record is incomplete.
A timeline of Rochester-area mycology
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1868–1913
Charles H. Peck builds a state fungi collection
Charles H. Peck served as New York State Botanist from 1868 to 1913. During those years, he built the New York State Museum’s mycology collection, amassing 33,600 fungal specimens. A few surviving records show how widely his collecting reached into western New York.
In 1872, Peck collected Marasmius longipes in Savannah, Wayne County. In 1904, he collected Phyllosticta pallidior at Bergen Swamp in Genesee County; that specimen is the holotype, or reference specimen, for the species. The Museum’s collection now holds more than 90,000 specimens and preserves many early records of American mycology.
Peck’s 1872 Savannah specimen · Peck’s 1904 Bergen Swamp holotype · New York State Museum: Charles Peck · New York State Museum Mycology Collection
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1871–1878
George W. Clinton collects fungi around Buffalo
George W. Clinton, a Buffalo-based collector, is another early mycologist represented in the New York State Museum’s records. His specimens include fungi gathered in Buffalo across the 1870s. Among them are the 1871 holotype of Uncinula macrospora, the 1874 holotype of Venturia clintonii, and an 1878 holotype of Peziza sphaerella, described by Peck and Clinton. These records give named, dated examples of the region’s early field and taxonomic work.
Clinton’s 1871 Buffalo specimen · 1874 specimen · 1878 specimen
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1890
The Rochester Academy and a landmark fungi inventory
The Rochester Academy of Science’s first Proceedings volume described its botanical section’s effort to compile a flora of Monroe County. In the same volume, Dr. Charles E. Fairman published “The Fungi of Western New York,” reporting five years of work on Orleans County’s mycological flora and more than 425 collected fungi. Fairman went on to amass a personal collection of more than 23,000 fungi and collected for Cornell’s herbarium and the New York Botanical Garden.
Read the digitized first volume of the Proceedings · Rochester Academy of Science Proceedings · New York Heritage collection
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1892–1918
George F. Atkinson advances Cornell mycology
Cornell recruited George F. Atkinson in 1892 as an assistant professor of cryptogamic botany. A leading mycologist and teacher, he focused much of his Cornell work on fungi, especially mushrooms, and described nearly 400 fungal species. He collected extensively around Ithaca and Cayuga Lake; his agaric specimens, field notes, and pioneering photographs are now preserved in Cornell’s Plant Pathology Herbarium as the Atkinson Collection (CUP-A).
CUP’s records give a few vivid local examples: a type specimen of Amanita floccocephala from Cascadilla Woods (1897), the holotype of Agaricus cretacellus from Cascadilla Woods (1900), and a type specimen of Pluteus flavofuligineus from Coy Glen (1901). These sites are in Ithaca, in the Finger Lakes region west of Syracuse—not western New York in the narrower Rochester-area sense.
1897 Cascadilla Woods specimen · 1900 Cascadilla Woods holotype · 1901 Coy Glen specimen
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1907
Cornell establishes the Plant Pathology Herbarium
When Cornell established its Department of Plant Pathology in 1907, its first chair, Herbert H. Whetzel, also founded the department’s herbarium with specimens from his personal collection. The Cornell Plant Pathology Herbarium (CUP) grew into a major research collection for fungi and plant disease. It now includes Atkinson’s important mushroom collection as well as the authors’ herbaria of Fairman and other mycologists.
Cornell Daily Sun history of CUP · About the Cornell Plant Pathology Herbarium · CUP collection profile and historical herbaria
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1962
Leo Tanghe teaches mushroom identification
By 1962, Dr. Leo Tanghe was teaching mushroom identification at the Rochester Museum of Arts and Sciences. The Museum’s year-end report lists a field course he directed with W. Stephen Thomas: eight sessions held from July through September. People who took Tanghe’s classes called themselves the Rochester Fungifiles, and they organized group hikes, including some of the first forays to Letchworth State Park.
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October 1984
RAMA is founded
In October 1984, the Rochester Fungifiles formally organized as the Rochester Area Mycological Association (RAMA) so they could continue learning together. The first meeting was held at Helmer Nature Center in Irondequoit, which hosted the club for several years. Founding members included Steve Daniel, Laramie Brown, William Hollenbaugh, and brothers Dave and Carl Wolf.
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1968–c. 2008 · Buffalo mycology
Ernst Both’s work on North American boletes
At the Buffalo Museum’s Clinton Herbarium, Both began the Bolete Collection in 1968; collecting continued for the next 40 years. He and Beatriz Ortiz-Santana published an index to the collection in 2012. Both also published The Boletes of North America: A Compendium, a major reference on this group of fungi. RAMA’s current calendar includes an annual Both Foray at Letchworth State Park, carrying his name into the club’s field-learning tradition.
USDA Forest Service: Both’s 2012 index and 1968 collection start · Bibliographic record for Both’s compendium · RAMA events and annual forays
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1993–present · publications
Alan and Arleen Bessette broaden access to New York mycology
Mycologists Alan and Arleen Bessette helped bring mushroom identification and fungal knowledge to readers across New York and beyond through books including Common Edible and Poisonous Mushrooms of New York. Alan authored or co-authored more than 30 books, advised the New York State Poison Control Center, and served for more than 20 years as scientific adviser to the Mid York Mycological Society. Arleen co-authored more than 20 books and mycology papers and is also known for her botanical photography. Their joint publication record began with Taming the Wild Mushroom: A Culinary Guide to Market Foraging in 1993 and continues today. Their 2025 second edition of Common Edible and Poisonous Mushrooms of New York is among their recent work. Their publications connect scientific expertise with public education and regional mycological communities.
University of Texas Press: Taming the Wild Mushroom (1993) · Syracuse University Press: Common Edible and Poisonous Mushrooms of New York · Alan Bessette publications · Arleen Bessette publications
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Today
Learning on public lands
RAMA’s current Events page lists monthly meetings, member forays, and two annual public forays at Letchworth State Park: the Both Foray in early June and the Tanghe Foray in mid-September.