Luis E. Peña Guzman

In the early morning of September 27, 1996, Luis Enrique Pena Guzman passed away at the age of 74. He was the victim of a bone cancer which ended his life after two months of suffering. Not only Chile, but also international entomology have lost one of the most important and knowledgeable entomologists; nobody knew better than he the fauna of his native country, and also that of the neighbouring countries in the New World. All who knew him, all who were accompanied by him during expeditions he managed, will agree that his contributions to their success were most decisive; amongst these were also some odonatologists. He was a self-taught person in the best sense of the word, and one of the last universal field scientists. At the early age of 19 years, he became a member of the “Sociedad Chilena de Entomologfa”; later he served as the Vice President and the Secretary for several years and was also a member of 17 other academic and scientific societies, some of which he had founded himself. Three consecutive times he was named as “Associate Investigator” and “Curator Affiliate in Zoology” of the Peabody Museum of Yale University, and he was “Associate Scientist of Entomology” of the American Museum of Natural History in New York until his death. For nine years he worked at the Faculty of Forestry and Agricultural Sciences of the University of Chile.