Clinton Hart Merriam
(December 5 1855-March 19 1942) was an American
zoologist,
ornithologist, entomologist and ethnographer.
He was
born in New York
City
in 1855. His father,
Clinton Levi Merriam, was a U.S.
congressman.
He studied biology and anatomy at Yale University
and went on to obtain an M.D. from the School of Physicians and
Surgeons at Columbia University
in 1879.
In 1886,
he became the first chief of the Division of Economic Ornithology
and Mammalogy of the United States
Department of Agriculture
, predecessor to the National Wildlife Research
Center and the United States Fish and
Wildlife Service. He was one of the original founders of the
National
Geographic Society
in 1888. He developed the "
life zones" concept to classify
biomes found in
North
America. In
mammalogy, he is known as
an excessive
splitter,
proposing, for example, tens of different species of North American
brown bears in several genera.
In 1899, he helped railroad magnate
E. H.
Harriman to organize an exploratory voyage along the
Alaska
coastline.
For a time
Merriam was a professor at Harvard University
.
Some species of animals that bear his name are Merriam's Wild
Turkey
Meliagris gallopavo meriami, the now extinct
Merriam's Elk
Cervus elaphus merriami, and Merriam's
Chipmunk
Tamias merriami. Much of his detail-oriented
taxonomy continues to be influential within mammalogical and
ornithological circles.
Later in life, funded by the Harriman family, Merriam's focus
shifted to studying and assisting the
Native American tribes
in the western United States. His contributions on the myths of
central California and on ethnogeography were particularly
noteworthy.
His sister
Florence
Augusta Merriam Bailey was a pioneering ornithologist who
introduced the idea of popular field guides for bird
identification.
He died in
Berkeley
, California
in 1942.
See also
References
- Bean, Lowell John. 1993. "Introduction". In The Dawn of the
World: Myths and Tales of the Miwok Indians of California, by
C. Hart Merriam, pp. 1-12. University of Nebraska Press,
Lincoln.
- Kroeber, A. L. 1955. "C. Hart Merriam as Anthropologist". In
Studies of California Indians, by C. Hart Merriam, pp.
vii-xiv. University of California Press, Berkeley.
- Sterling, Keir B. 1974. The Last of the Naturalists: The
Career of C. Hart Merriam. Arno Press, New York.
- Anon. 1942 [Merriam, C. H.] Ent. News
53:150
- Anon. 1942 [Merriam, C. H.] Science 95: 318
- Daubunnire, R. F. 1938: [Merriam, C. H.]. Quart.
Rev. Biol. 13:327-332
External links
Wikis
Map
Search
