health, Walsh moved to Rock Island, Illinois in 1850 and started a successful lumber business. After his move to Little Rock, Walsh became active in politics. As a Radical Republican he was opposed to slavery and frequently expressed his strong opinions in print. He was actively involved in the fight to admit Kansas as a free state. In 1856 he helped to establish a local chapter of the Kansas Settlers Society which sought to encourage and support the settlement of Kansas by people who opposed slavery. In 1858 he suspected the Little Rock city council was embezzling city funds and in order to gain access to the financial records, he successfully campaigned for election to the council. Once the corruption was exposed he resigned his position. Entomology Around 1858 Walsh sold his business and earned his living from a number of rental properties that he owned and managed. Although he had studied natural history and collected insects while at Cambridge, it was only at this point that he devoted himself full-time to entomology. By 1859 Walsh was lecturing on insects at the Illinois State Fair where he also displayed his collection of 1,650 insects he had recently collected. In 1860 Walsh delivered a very well-received lecture on insect pests to the Illinois State Horticultural Society. Later he wrote several articles for various farm periodicals. Initially, perhaps influenced by his own farming experience, Walsh focused on the practical aspects of insects as agricultural pests. However, starting in 1862 he published several scholarly papers in the journals of scientific societies such as the Boston Society of Natural History and the Entomological Society of Philadelphia. These works provided detailed observations of insect metamorphosis and natural history; compared morphological characters for a given taxon; or described new species. In his new-found career as an entomologist, Walsh was an active participant in several scientific societies. In 1858 he became a founding member of the Illinois Natural History Society. In 1861 he was elected a corresponding member of the Entomological Society of Philadelphia, and in 1863 he became a member of the Boston Society of Natural History. Walsh was also closely affiliated with the influential Illinois State Agricultural Society. It was this organization that successfully lobbied the state legislature to appoint Walsh as the first Illinois State Entomologist. In 1868 Illinois became only the second state to appoint an official entomologist. Although his official appointment was