With the sudden departure of our colleague, Tony, the International Odonatological Society (S.I.O.) and its mainstream journals, ODONATOLOGICA, NOTULAE ODONATOLOGICAE and ADVANCES IN ODONATOLOGY, lost yet another cornerstone, the world odonatological community lost a friend and a colleague, and the dragonflies one of their most excellent and prolific students. The Editors of this journal lost an intimate friend and associate. Our correspondence and comradship with JOHN ANTHONY (TONY) LINTHORNE WATSON commenced in the remote summer of 1963, when he was working at the Developmental Biology Center at Cleveland, Ohio (United States), soon upon his return from the legendary “Colloquium on the Odonata”, organized by the late Professor B.E. Montgomery at Lafayette, and which, in a way, was a forerunner of the present International Symposia. The comradship developed rapidly into a friendship. Since February 1973 he became increasingly involved in the SIO affairs, and in February 1978 he volunteered to accept the responsibilities of the SIO Liaison Office for Australasia and the Southern Pacific. Since about that time, he was involved in all major SIO operations and activities, whether as a member of various editorial boards, or as a Council member. From the very first meeting of the Odonate Specialist Group (Kyoto, 1980), operating in the framework of the IUCN Species Survival Commission, he was among its most active members. Among his last services to SIO was the recording of Council meeting minutes at the 12th International Symposium of Odonatology (Osaka, 1993), at which meeting he was requested to consider accepting the office of the President of the Society for the 1997-1999 term ... The help with one of the papers, published in the present issue, was the last work he performed for ODONATOLOGICA.