|
Great
Men of the World of Molluscs
|
In this
paper, I will only cover a few of the more important "ALL-TIME GREATS" and their
contributions to the world of molluscs - there have been a great many, plenty
of them amateurs (i.e., folks who do things just for the love of it, not for
payment!)
|
Conchologists:
(They study the shell part of mollusc - their external Skeletons) |
|
Margaret
Cavendish Bentinick, second duchess of Portland (1714-1786)
England was an attractive, wealthy lady who had an insatiable taste for
collecting shells. She entertained such dignitaries as King George III,
Rousseau (French botanist), Captain James Cook, Sir Joseph Banks, and
George Humphrey (shell dealer). She hired Daniel Solander, the knowledgeable
conchologist and student of the great Linnaeus, to curate and prepare
a catalogue of her huge, growing collection. Hugh
Cumming (1791-1865) England: his
name is almost synonymous with conchology - no man has ever equaled the
amount of material nor discovered a larger number of new shells. (Nearly
2,000 species). Today, his collection resides in the British Museum of
Natural History in London Philippe Dautzenberg (1849- 1935) Belgium: an outstanding conchologist, accumulated rarities and old collections. By the age of 65, he had acquired more than 30,000 species and a magnificent library. His well documented collection is preserved in the Institute Royal des Sciences Naturelles in Brussels. Some of the other
great conchologists are:
|
|
Malacologists
(Scientists who study molluscs - bodies and all) |
|
Thomas
Say (1787-1834) is known as the
father of malacology. He did a lot of the initial organizational work
("Taxonomy") on how various species of molluscs are related to each other,
and also described many species in the process. Dr.
Martin Lister, (mid 1800s ) England Physician: Dr. Lister's
great work Historia Conchyliorum, consisting of a thousand engraved plates
of worldwide species, was for years the only reliable source of illustration
for most species. Johann
Chemnitz (late 1700s ) Denmark clergyman: wrote eight enormous
volumes on the shells of the world. His beautiful colored plates, long
and accurate descriptions, attention to locality data, when he had it,
and classification were a great stimulus to others in the field. Henry
August Pilsbry (1862-1957) USA:
produced superior research for seventy-five years at the Academy of Natural
Sciences of Philadelphia. He described over 3,000 species and genera,
and for some time also served as the editor of the Nautilus, America's
oldest mollusc journal. R.
Tucker Abbott (1919 - 1995): This remarkable man was
one of the "bridges" between the old and the new schools of Malacology.
His nearly unbelievable productivity (he founded and edited the journals
Johnsonia and Indo-Pacific Molluscs, published
a large number of books both for Malacologists and Conchologists of all
sorts, described many species, founded the Bailey-Matthews Shell museum,
taught and supervised graduate Students for many years......) was only
matched by his generosity of spirit and the keen interest he took in all
aspects of Conchology in the United States: Tucker Abbott, Ruth Turner,
Jim Harasewych, A.H. Verrill and Bill Clench, are largely responsible
for the renaissance and transformation of the study of Molluscs (in North
America) in the latter half of our century, and Tucker, along with such
other notable authors as Phillip Dance and Percy Morris,
was instrumental in preventing shell collecting in North America from
declining into obscurity, by providing a wealth of affordable, largely
nonscientific shell identification literature. For a great Biography,
see Lynn Scheu's
article on the COA web site. Some other great malacologists were:
|