The concept of a system for filing and for the cross-referencing of specimen, collection, and identification information, was first advanced by A. D. Hopkins in 1894. The System was formally initiated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 1902 by Hopkins himself, who was subsequently named Chief of Forest Insect Investigations. It was still in use in 1987 by more than twenty Forest Service units of Forest Insect and Disease Research and Forest Pest Management, and by the Agricultural Research Service Systematic Entomology Laboratory (ARS-SEL). A salient feature or the System was the controlled assignment of “Hopkins numbers” to avoid redundancy within or between field units. These unique numbers allow for the keying of records, an essential pre-requisite for the creation of a proper relational database. The paper records of the Hopkins Notes and Records System and the corresponding digital records in the Hopkins US System Index (HUSSI) are co-dependent repositories for data about specimens of forest insects and their damage. These specimens were curated by Government professionals beginning with Hopkins' work at the USDA. The more than 80 years of records with identification and collection information are from all geographic areas managed by the USDA Forest Service, as well as small subset of records from other countries.
Genesis A.D. Hopkins, commonly referred to as the father of forest entomology in the United States, formulated the record-keeping system that now bears his name. Hopkins brought his system to the federal government when he came to work for the Division of Entomology in the late 1890s, by which time he had already been using his record-keeping system at West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, where he previously worked. Hopkins then brought the system to the USDA Division of Entomology in 1902. It was subsequently adopted by personnel of Forest Insect Investigations at field stations throughout the country. The System contains U.S. in its name to distinguish it from those earlier Hopkins records at West Virginia University. The Hopkins U.S. System became widely used by Forest Service Research, by other pest management units, and also by ARS-SEL. It was in continuous use until the mid-1980s.
The Hopkins Notebook Series The biological data from the original Hopkins records were recorded on either 3"×5" forms, or on 3"×5" or 5"×8" cards (hereafter referred to simply as cards) that were filed in the Hopkins Notebook Series. These Notebooks are the original “database” from which the Hopkins U.S. System developed. The system, represented in these volumes, consists of notebook entries bearing “checklist numbers,” and a set of such file cards. Cards are indexed to the descriptive narratives or notes that appear in the notebooks in numerical order by checklist number. Additional notes often provide extensive textual descriptions of the writer’s observations and many include detailed drawings as well. The table of contents for a given notebook was derived from the way in which those checklist numbers were assigned to individual collectors. Taken as a whole, the Notebook Series chronicles the work and travels of many of the pioneering figures of North American entomology, from the turn of the century to about 1920. Beginning in 1899, number-series – usually in blocks of 100 to 200 – appear to have been assigned to entomologists as needed. There are also blocks of numbers that were evidently set aside to accommodate material that was sent to the staff entomologists for identification. Such blocks of numbers are designated “Office Notes.” Some blocks of numbers in the Office Notes series are from outside the contiguous United States. For example, specimens or collections from Central and South America, Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, and Africa appear there. The information shown in the Office Notes often include references to the original correspondence accompanying the specimens when they were submitted.
The Hopkins Record cards The card observations consist of the collection and identification information associated, by number, with specific insect or damage specimens. The numbers also correspond to identical numbers originally attached to mounted insects in collections distributed across the country. They connect that field sample to the information about how, when, and by whom, the work was done. All of that information is detailed by the Hopkins Record cards. The cards are the only link that exists between the sample and its physical provenance. At some archive locations, the early records included the above-mentioned notebooks or ledgers containing more detailed information. The card files usually have three components: a numerical file, the basic file of cards in numerical order; the species file or insect species index; and host file or host index. The System has been applied differently at the various field locations; some units have only the numerical file.
Organizational framework Hopkins' organizing scheme was based on a series of duplicate paper records that contained collection and identification information about the specimens. Each record was given a unique sequential Hopkins U.S. Number. Specimens, each one bearing its own unique Hopkins US Number, and collection records were stored at Forest Service Research Stations and Laboratories, Regional Offices, and at the ARS-SEL in the U.S. National Museum / Smithsonian Institution. The Hopkins US System contained about 163,000 paper records representing several hundred thousand identified specimens or series of specimens. These are either of insects or samples of insect-damage. Each record has information about taxon, insect and plant association, collection location, date, and collector at a minimum. In addition to the drawings and textual narratives, the record can also have measurements, notes on the research study or spray program, or rearing and other biological data provided by the original collector.
Specimen collection, preparation and record keeping All the details of the overall process can be found in R.G. Mitchell's unpublished monograph. That work includes "the procedures one follows from the time insect materiel is collected until identifications are obtained". A numbered list of those procedures, taken from the monograph, is reproduced below, with a block diagram of the corresponding workflow shown on the right:
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