THREADS OF CALHOUN THURSDAY: Dr. Edward F. Knipling (1909–2000)

Edward Fred Knipling was born in Port Lavaca, Texas, on March 20, 1909. He was the ninth of ten children born to German immigrant Henry John Knipling and his wife, Hulda Rasch Knipling, whose parents had emigrated from Germany to Brenham, Texas, in the 1860s. Edward grew up in a German-speaking Lutheran household on a 150-acre farm along Westerlund Grade Road in northern Calhoun County. The family raised cotton and corn, kept cows, hogs, and chickens, and produced nearly all of their own food.

As a young man working the fields and tending livestock in Calhoun County, Edward witnessed firsthand the devastating effects of screwworm infestations on animals and boll weevils on cotton, along with many other insect pests. His early exposure to these insects in their natural environment proved invaluable later in life when he chose entomology as a career—one that would span more than 40 years and earn this Calhoun County native recognition as one of the world’s leading scientists.

Edward graduated from Port Lavaca High School in 1926. He went on to earn both his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees from Texas A&M College, and in 1947 he received his PhD in entomology from Iowa State University.

While studying at Iowa State, he met his future wife, Phoebe Rebecca Hall, who was also pursuing doctoral studies in the life sciences. They married in 1934 and eventually had five children: Edwina (1937), Anita (1938), Edward (1940), Gary (1944), and Ronald (1947). It was also at Iowa State that Edward met Dr. E. W. Laake of the USDA, who offered him a position working on screwworm trapping and population monitoring in Menard, Texas, beginning in 1931.

Edward worked intermittently at Menard over a nine-year period while continuing his graduate studies and accepting duty assignments involving screwworm research in Georgia and studies of other livestock insect pests in Illinois and Iowa. In 1935, at Menard, he met Dr. Raymond C. Bushland, who would become his long-time friend and collaborator. At the time, their research focused on treating cattle already infested with screwworm maggots—known to ranchers as “wormies.” While the team developed an effective treatment smear, Edward realized that true control required preventing infestation altogether rather than treating wounds after the fact.

Through careful observation, he discovered that adult screwworm flies followed a predictable pattern: on the first day they frantically attempted to escape confinement, on the second day they fed, and on the third and fourth days they mated. Crucially, females would mate only once. This insight became the foundation of a revolutionary idea. If sterile male flies could be introduced into the population, females that mated with them would produce no offspring. Repeating this process generation after generation would cause the population to collapse. Although the idea seems straightforward today, it was considered radical at the time. “Forget this crazy idea and concentrate on more important things,” one supervisor reportedly told him, according to a 1975 issue of Current Biography. Undeterred, Edward refined his concept into a method of insect control that relied on overwhelming wild populations with sterile males to suppress or eradicate the species in ecologically isolated regions. He also developed a mathematical probability model to predict population decline based on the number of sterile males released. This approach became known as the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT). Its practical application, however, was delayed by the onset of World War II.

During the war, Edward’s research was redirected to support U.S. Army efforts to control insects that spread deadly diseases among Allied troops, including typhus and malaria. He led the USDA team that developed MYL and DDT as effective controls for body lice, saving millions of lives. For this work, he received the U.S. Army Typhus Commission Medal in 1946, the President’s Medal for Merit in 1947, and the King’s Medal for Service to the British Government in the Cause of Freedom in 1948.

After the war and following completion of his PhD in 1947, Dr. Knipling moved his family to Washington, D.C., to lead entomological research for the USDA. Working again with Dr. Bushland, he helped bring SIT to full realization in the early 1950s. Using radiation to sterilize male screwworm flies, the team tested the method in 1954 on the island of Curaçao. Releasing 150,000 sterile flies per week over the island’s 176 square miles eradicated the screwworm within three weeks and four fly generations.

Following this success, SIT was implemented on a larger scale. Screwworms were eradicated from Florida by 1959, from the entire United States by 1972, and—through international cooperation—from Mexico and Central America as far south as Panama by 2001. The technique has since been adapted to control other destructive pests, including the Mediterranean fruit fly, Japanese melon fly, and the tsetse fly responsible for African sleeping sickness.

Dr. Knipling retired from the USDA in 1973, having risen to become the top entomological researcher in the Agricultural Research Service. For the next 27 years, he remained active as a consultant and collaborator, continuing to shape modern pest management strategies.

Over the course of his career, he authored or co-authored more than 200 scientific publications and wrote a comprehensive book on the principles of pest control and management. His numerous honors include the USDA Distinguished Service Award and the Hoblitzelle National Award (1960), the Golden Plate Award of the Academy of Achievement (1962), the National Medal of Science presented by President Lyndon B. Johnson (1966), and the President’s Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service presented by President Richard Nixon (1971). He also received four honorary Doctor of Science degrees and was listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in the World, Donald Robinson’s 100 Most Important People in the World, and Progressive Farmer magazine’s 1999 list of 21 scientific pioneers who shaped American agriculture.

In 2013, the Texas State Historical Commission erected a historical marker in Calhoun County honoring Dr. Edward F. Knipling. The marker is located on the north side of the Calhoun County Extension Building at 186 Henry Barber Way.

Dr. Knipling passed away at his Virginia home on March 17, 2000, at the age of 91—just two months after participating in a videotaped interview reflecting on his life and work (the link is shared below). His wife, Phoebe, had preceded him in death two years earlier. He was survived by five children, fourteen grandchildren, and nine great-grandchildren. He is buried beside his wife at National Memorial Park in Fairfax County, Virginia. Edward’s parents as well as several of his siblings are buried in the Port Lavaca or Greenlawn cemeteries in Calhoun County.

Edward Fred Knipling, Calhoun County native — a man who applied the keen observation and bold thinking he learned working the fields of Calhoun County, Texas as a boy to grow up and make one of the most consequential contributions to modern agriculture.

Compiled by Jody Weaver

Calhoun County Historical Commission application text for the THC Marker

https://archive.org/details/cat31344919  Interview with Dr. Knipling January 2000