Miron Elisha Hard

Hard wrote in his 1908 book "The Mushroom, Edible and Otherwise"^[4] that he became interested in mushrooms while he was superintendent of schools in Salem, Ohio when he observed Bohemian immigrant children collecting mushrooms in the fields and forests around the town. By the time he published his book Hard had spent many years collecting and commissioning photographs of the mushrooms of Ohio. His book has a preface by Ohio State University mycologist William Ashbrook Kellerman, who in an advance review of the book described Hard affectionately as "that mushroom-hunter, mushroom-eater, mushroom-writer, as it were, mushroom-fiend..."^[5]

While researching for the book, Hard brought several new species to the attention of mycologists. For example, George Francis Atkinson in 1906 noted two new species, Naucoria paludosella (now Pholiota paludosella) and Stropharia hardii sent to him by Hard and Kellerman, naming the second one in Hard's honor.^[6] Hard's book received favorable reviews at the time and in 1976 when it was reprinted by Dover Publications.^[7][8]

Hard contributed a journal article, "An Interesting Cordyceps", to the June 1906 Mycological Bulletin.^[9]

The standard author abbreviation Hard is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.^[10]

Hard married Elizabeth Catherine Shallcross (1844-1931) on December 29, 1874. They had two daughters, Honora E. Hard (1881-1965) and Anita L. Hard Wilson (1883-1961).