ABSTRACT
In the 1970s, I had a grant to study vegetation in the Fakahatchee Strand State Preserve in Collier County. The first person I hired to work for me was an unlikely field botanist, Julie Jones. She had terrible vision (“I am legally blind”), had spent her college years working in a laboratory, and knew nothing about wild plants. However, she was incredibly enthusiastic and turned out to be one of the best field assistants I ever worked with. She went on to become one of the first two women to be hired by the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission, and attributes passing the field exam to working for me.
