Mary Wharton

I had the pleasure of reading Paul Stamets' Mycelia Running, and asked him to give me a copy of his depiction of how a mycelium produces and grows a mushroom, the fruiting body of a mycelium. Thanks to Paul, my talk about mushrooms and mushroom mycelia at the Reston Garden Club was a great success. Marion Lobstein, who has studied mushrooms in great depth at NIH and spoke along side of me, helped the talk be a huge success. Paul and Marion are marvelous promoters of the unique abilities of how mushrooms in their various niches fill in the often overlooked spots in our food chain. Paul also is an amazing visionary, seeing the possible uses of mushrooms and mushroom mycelia for both the future and the not-so-distant future. Paul Stamets' family members have helped create futuristic characters who play "Astro-Mycologists" on some of the later episodes of Star Trek. Marion, a lady with a big heart and an even bigger brain, has been nominated by her students year after year at Manassas Community College as Teacher of the Year. Marion is also a member of the Virginia Academy of Science, and still continues to write plant descriptions for the Flora of Virginia.