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George S. Vasey

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English-American botanist (1822–1893)
George S. Vasey
From Canby & Rose (1893)
Born(1822-02-28)February 28, 1822
Scarborough, North Riding of Yorkshire, England
DiedMarch 4, 1893(1893-03-04) (aged 71)
Washington, D.C., United States
Alma materBerkshire Medical Institute
Known forChief Botanist of USDA, curator of the United States National Herbarium
SpouseMartha Jane Scott
AwardsHon. M.A., fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Scientific career
InstitutionsUSDA
Author abbrev. (botany)Vasey

George S. Vasey (February 28, 1822 – March 4, 1893) was an English-born American physician and botanist. He practiced medicine in Illinois for nearly two decades. He was appointed Chief Botanist at the United States Department of Agriculture in 1872, a position he held for the remainder of his life. His greatest achievement was the building up of the United States National Herbarium.

Life

George Vasey was born on February 28, 1822 near the town of Scarborough, England, the fourth of ten children. His family emigrated to the United States the next year, settling in the village of Oriskany, New York. He left school at age 12 to become a store clerk in Oriskany. By age 13, he had expressed an interest in botany by manually copying a text book on the subject in its entirety. This interest was nurtured by a chance encounter with the botanist Peter D. Knieskern, who later encouraged young Vasey to correspond with other botanists including Torrey, Gray, and others.

By the age of 21, Vasey had graduated from the Oneida Institute. He attended the Berkshire Medical Institute, graduating with an M.D. degree in 1846. In December of that same year, he married Martha Jane Scott. The couple initially settled in Dexter, New York but in 1848 the family moved to Illinois, first to Elgin, and then to Ringwood. Here Vasey would practice medicine for nearly two decades. During this time, he kept his passion for botany alive by continued correspondence and field work. He became a founding member of the Illinois Natural History Society in 1858, and over the next few years, he wrote prolifically for the society and the weekly newspaper Prairie Farmer.

In 1854, Vasey opened a dry goods store to support his growing family, which now included four children and his mother, Jane Frankish. Within a decade he had three more children but the youngest died from whooping cough in 1864. Seeking a milder climate, Vasey relocated the family to Richview in southern Illinois. Despite this, both his wife and his mother died in 1866. Vasey subsequently stopped writing for about a year. Due to an unrelated legal matter, he was also beset with heavy financial trouble.

Vasey married the widow Rachel Catherine Barber in 1867. While Kate assumed complete responsibility for the family and its financial affairs, Vasey considered an offer to participate in an expedition to Colorado. This marked the beginning of George Vasey's career as a botanist, which spanned a 25-year period from 1868 to 1893.

Following a brief illness, George Vasey died in Washington, D.C. on March 4, 1893. He was buried in Rock Creek Cemetery two days later.

Career

John Wesley Powell invited George Vasey to participate in an expedition to Colorado in 1868. Vasey, working with other members of the traveling party, documented 66 pages of flora and collected almost 700 plant specimens during the expedition. Greatly enthused by the adventure, Vasey dedicated himself to botanical pursuits. He co-edited the journal The American Entomologist and Botanist prior to becoming curator of the Illinois State University Natural History Museum in 1870. He resigned the latter position to succeed Charles Christopher Parry as the Chief Botanist at the United States Department of Agriculture in 1872, a position he held until his death in 1893. He quickly began work to improve the poor state of the National Herbarium, by organizing an exhibit of the country's trees for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The herbarium, hosted by the Smithsonian Institution, is considered the crowning achievement of his career, particularly its grass collection, of which he was a specialist. In 1889 the Smithsonian named him Honorary Curator. As Chief Botanist he launched the Contributions from the United States National Herbarium. With George Thurber he worked on grasses for Asa Gray and John Torrey's Flora of North America.

Until 1870 he would maintain an extensive correspondence and collect a great many specimens both in Oneida County and later McHenry County. However, he did not publish material of scientific relevance until the 1870s.

Of his published work his several-volumes monograph of the United States grass, the last part of which was published after his death, is one of the most notable, as are his 1884 Agricultural Grasses of the United States and his work to describe unpublished species who had accumulated in the herbarium, a work he completed less than a week before his death in 1893.

Awards

He was granted an honorary M.A. in 1864 from Illinois Wesleyan University. In 1869 he was made a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and in 1892, of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; that same year he was representative to the 1892 International Botanical Congress in Genoa, where he was a vice-president.

Selected publications

Upon his death in 1893, a comprehensive bibliography of the published works by George Vasey was prepared by Josephine A. Clark, Botanical Division, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Legacy

The genus Vaseya was established when the American botanist George Thurber described Vaseya comata in 1863. At a time when Vasey was still practicing medicine in Illinois, Thurber characterized him as "one of the most zealous of our Western botanists". Two other genera have been named in honor of George Vasey, Vaseyanthus (Vasey Flower) and Vaseyochloa (Vasey Grass). The Belgian botanist Alfred Cogniaux established genus Vaseyanthus by describing Vaseyanthus rosei in 1891. In his description, Cogniaux referred to Vasey as a "learned botanist". The American botanist Albert Spear Hitchcock described the genus Vaseyochloa in 1933. The member species Vaseyochloa multinervosa (Vasey) Hitchc. was first described as Melica multinervosa by Vasey himself. As of December 2024, Vaseya Thurb. and Vaseyanthus Cogn. are synonyms of Muhlenbergia Schreb. and Echinopepon Naudin, respectively, whereas the generic name Vaseyochloa Hitchc. is widely accepted.

There are dozens of taxon names that include an epithet such as vaseyi, vaseyanus, vaseyana, or vaseyanum. Many of these names honor George Vasey but some them acknowledge his son, George Richard Vasey, a plant collector who collected hundreds of plants between 1875 and 1889. Notable examples of names that recognize the elder Vasey include Quercus vaseyana Buckley, Stipa vaseyi Scribn., and Aristida vaseyi Wooton & Standl. The latter two are commonly referred to as Vasey Feather Grass and Vasey Three-awn Grass, respectively.

The standard author abbreviation Vasey is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.

References

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  1. Canby & Rose (1893), Plate XVIII.
  2. Canby & Rose (1893), p. 171.
  3. Collins, Ed (Winter 2001). "Searching for Doctor Vasey". Chicago Wilderness Magazine online. Archived from the original on 2008-05-14. Retrieved 2008-01-01.
  4. Coville (1893).
  5. "J. W. Powell Colorado Exploring Expedition, 1868". Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 19 December 2024.
  6. Armstrong, Joseph E. "George S. Vasey Herbarium (ISU)". Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  7. Canby & Rose (1893), p. 170.
  8. Canby & Rose (1893), pp. 176–183.
  9. "Vaseya comata Thurb.". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  10. Thurber, George (1863). "Gramineae". Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 15: 78–80. Retrieved 26 December 2024.
  11. ^ Dunne-Brady, John. "VASEY, George S. (1822–1893)" (PDF). pp. 64–65. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  12. "Vaseyanthus rosei Cogn.". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  13. Cogniaux, Alfred (1891). "A new cucurbit". Zoe; a Biological Journal. 1: 368–369. Retrieved 26 December 2024.
  14. "Vaseyochloa Hitchc.". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 26 December 2024.
  15. Vasey, George (1891). "A new grass: Melica (?) multinervosa". Botanical Gazette. 16: 235–236. Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  16. "Vaseya Thurb.". Plants of the World Online. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  17. "Vaseyanthus Cogn.". Plants of the World Online. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  18. "Vaseyochloa Hitchc.". Plants of the World Online. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  19. "Search for 'vaseyi'". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  20. "Search for 'vaseyanus'". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  21. "Search for 'vaseyana'". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  22. "Search for 'vaseyanum'". International Plant Names Index (IPNI). Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew; Harvard University Herbaria & Libraries; Australian National Botanic Gardens. Retrieved 28 December 2024.
  23. Charters, Michael L. "An Annotated Dictionary of Botanical and Biographical Etymology". California Plant Names: Latin and Greek Meanings and Derivations. Retrieved 18 December 2024.
  24. International Plant Names Index.  Vasey.

Bibliography

External links

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