Highlands Biological Station
E. E. Reinke

Between the Thelma Howell Administrative Building and the Coker Laboratory at the Highlands Biological Station is the E. E. ( Edwin Eustace) Reinke Library established by Dr. Reinke, a Founder and the First Director of the Highlands Museum and Biological Laboratory. Little known to visitors of the Nature Center or Botanical Gardens, the many college and graduate students and researchers from around the world use this library for their studies.
First suggested in 1941 by Botany Professor Kaufman visiting from the University of Alabama, he and other researchers told Reinke and the Trustees that they needed a library to aid in their study of the plateau flora and fauna. To that end, Reinke established the library in 1945 and then others began to donate books and published research reprint papers to the Station for library use. Upon Reinke’s death in 1945, his widow, Emily, gave all of his books and a collection of this personal papers to the Station which comprised the initial library. Other major donors to the library include: Lindsay Olive, C. K. Wall family, Sargent Family, and the family of Byron Ingram among others.
Dr. Reinke was a Princeton graduate awarded at Ph.D in Biology in 1914. He was primary affiliated with the Biology Department of Vanderbilt University in Nashville, holding various positions in that department including Chairman. Reinke spent his summers in Highlands with his family for many years, even commissioning a log cabin by local famed builder, Joe Webb, which still stands today as the location of the Highlands Hiker.
In 1928-1929 Clark Foreman of Atlanta and a summer resident of Highlands, approached Reinke about a biological station in Highlands. The Station Trustees asked Reinke to study the Highlands region with a view of establishing a southern biological research station in the mountains. His findings were published in the Highlands Museum of Natural History Publication No. 1, entitled “Report on the Necessity of a Mountain Biological Research Station in the South.”
Reinke’s primary research included experimental work in the field of hormones and the pituitary gland in the life pattern of vertebrates, namely salamanders, which he carried out at the Highlands Laboratory. Some of his original drawings were included in his correspondence files, an illustration of which is shown here.
The Reinke Library is non-lending library, except for registered students and research faculty, but is open to visitors by reservation. Its holdings are available online through the Hunter Library at Western Carolina University.
-Bryding Adams, November 2024