Welcome to the Encyclopedia of Arkansas

William J. Baerg—a naturalist, entomologist, and teacher who served thirty-one years as head of the Department of Entomology at the University of Arkansas (UA) in Fayetteville (Washington County)—was born. His research on black widow spiders, tarantulas, scorpions, and other arthropods led to descriptions of their behavior, biology, and natural history that had previously been largely ignored by biologists and entomologists. Baerg occasionally used himself as an experimental subject to test the effects of venom on humans, in one case allowing himself to be bitten repeatedly by a black widow spider; he lived to be ninety-four years old.