- Title:
- The phylogeny of angiosperms
- Author:
- Coulter, John Merle, 1851-1928
Switch to EncyclopediaClose X
COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928.
"John Merle Coulter … botanist, was born at Ningpo, China, the son of missionary parents, Moses Stanley and Caroline E. (Crowe) Coulter. He graduated with the A.B. degree from Hanover College in 1870. In 1872 he was assistant geologist on the Hayden Survey. While the expedition was waiting in the mountains for Hayden, the rest of the party whiled away the time playing cards; but since young Coulter did not know how to play, he collected plants. When Hayden arrived, he was so impressed by Coulter's collections that he appointed him botanist of the expedition. The object of the expedition was to look for the rumored hot springs and geysers of what is now Yellowstone Park. When they found the geysers, each member was assigned one of the holes for study. Since Coulter was the youngest member of the party, they assigned him one of the smaller holes. It turned out to be Old Faithful.
"The study of his botanical collections took him to Washington, where he met Asa Gray. The meeting was the beginning of a life-long friendship. Coulter became Gray's most distinguished pupil and with Sereno Watson he edited (1890) the sixth edition of Gray's famous Manual. In 1873 he received the A.M. degree from Hanover College and was professor of natural sciences there, 1874-79, and professor of biology in Wabash College, 1879-91. During this period (in 1884) he received the degree of Ph.D. from Indiana State University. He was a life-long friend of David Starr Jordan, and when Jordan resigned from the presidency of Indiana State University (1891), he persuaded Coulter to succeed him. The politics of a state university and the worry about securing funds from politicians were so distasteful that Coulter resigned in 1893 and became president of Lake Forest University, which he thought was so well endowed that there would be no financial problems. Even at Lake Forest, however, administrative duties interfered seriously with his chosen work and he went to the University of Chicago (1896), where he was able to devote nearly thirty years to building up a strong department and to training young men and women for teaching and research. After retiring from active teaching in 1925 he became adviser to the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research at Yonkers, N. Y., for the foundation of which he was largely responsible …
"In 1875, while at Hanover College, he founded the BOTANICAL GAZETTE, which he not only edited, but also managed and often financed. It has become the leading botanical journal of America. Reviews of the critical type, as distinguished from the colorless type of abstracting journals, have always been a feature of the GAZETTE, and Coulter's reviews are models of this kind of writing … What would have been his greatest contribution, a history of botany, will probably never be completed. For years he had been gathering material, and, occasionally, in lectures he had given glimpses of what the work might be. He had just completed a collection of biographical sketches when he died.
"Coulter's greatest influence was not through his books and papers, however, numerous and good as they were, but through the men and women he trained. No other American botanist has so many students holding high positions. He belonged to botanical organizations at home and abroad and received all the major honors his fellow botanists could bestow upon him. Before his death, his students had already established the John M. Coulter Research Fellowship in Botany, to support exceptional students engaged in research …"
He was the author of a great number of government publications, textbooks and contributions to learned journals and serials not eligible for listing here.
Condensed from the Dictionary of American Biography, Vol. IV.
- Catalogue of the Plants of Indiana (withC. R. Barnes). Crawfordsville, Ind., 1881.
Search "Catalogue of the Plants of Indiana" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Manual of the Botany of the Rocky Mountain Region.
New York, 1885.
Search "Manual of the Botany of the Rocky Mountain Region" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Handbook of Plant Dissection (withJoseph C. Arthur and C. R. Barnes). New York, 1886.
Search "Handbook of Plant Dissection" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States (withAsa Gray and Sereno Watson). New York, 1889.
Search "Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Practical Education.
Indianapolis, 1891.
Search "Practical Education" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Manual of Texan Botany. 1893.
Search "Manual of Texan Botany" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - The Botanical Outlook. Lincoln,
1895.
Search "The Botanical Outlook" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Plants in Their Environment.
Chicago, 1896.
Search "Plants in Their Environment" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Evolution. Chicago, 1897.
Search "Evolution" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Mission of Science in Education. An Address Delivered
at… University of Michigan. Ann Arbor,
Mich., 1900.
Search "Mission of Science in Education. An Address Delivered at… University of Michigan" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - An Analytical Key to Some of the Common Wild and Cultivated
Species of Flowering Plants. New York, 1900.
Search "An Analytical Key to Some of the Common Wild and Cultivated Species of Flowering Plants" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Morphology of Spermatophytes. Part I, Gymnosperms (withCharles J. Chamberlain). New York, 1901.
Search "Morphology of Spermatophytes. Part I, Gymnosperms" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - The Polity of the Y. M. C. A.Chicago, 1901.
Search "The Polity of the Y. M. C. A." by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - The Student Y. M. C. A. as It Relates to the Entire
Association Movement. Chicago, 1901.
Search "The Student Y. M. C. A. as It Relates to the Entire Association Movement" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Organic Evolution as Illustrated by Plants.
Chicago, 1902.
Search "Organic Evolution as Illustrated by Plants" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Phylogeny of Angiosperms.
Chicago, 1903.
Search "Phylogeny of Angiosperms" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Morphology of Angiosperms (withCharles J. Chamberlain). New York, 1903.
Search "Morphology of Angiosperms" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - New Manual of Botany of the Central Rocky Mountains. (Revised byAven Nelson.) New York, 1909.
Search "New Manual of Botany of the Central Rocky Mountains" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Practical Nature Study and Elementary Agriculture (withJohn Gaylord Coulter and Alice Jean Patterson). New York, 1909.
Search "Practical Nature Study and Elementary Agriculture" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Morphology of Gymnosperms.
Chicago, 1910.
Search "Morphology of Gymnosperms" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Elementary Studies in Botany. New
York, 1913.
Search "Elementary Studies in Botany" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Evolution of Sex in Plants.
Chicago, 1914.
Search "Evolution of Sex in Plants" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Fundamentals of Plant Breeding. New
York, 1914.
Search "Fundamentals of Plant Breeding" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Evolution, Heredity and Eugenics.
Bloomington, Ill., 1916.
Search "Evolution, Heredity and Eugenics" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Record of the Doctors in Botany of the University of Chicago,
1897-1916 (withCharles J. Chamberlain). Chicago, 1916.
Search "Record of the Doctors in Botany of the University of Chicago, 1897-1916" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Plant Genetics (withMerle Crowe Coulter). Chicago, 1918.
Search "Plant Genetics" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Where Evolution and Religion Meet (withMerle Crowe Coulter). New York, 1924.
Search "Where Evolution and Religion Meet" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X - Botanical Research as a Career. Washington,
D. C., 1925.
Search "Botanical Research as a Career" by COULTER, JOHN MERLE: 1851-1928. in:
Close X
- Catalogue of the Plants of Indiana (withC. R. Barnes). Crawfordsville, Ind., 1881.
- Publication Year:
- 1903
- Source:
- Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1903. 6 p. 29 cm.
- Bookmark:
- https://purl.dlib.indiana.edu/iudl/inauthors/VAC0869
THE PHYLOGENY OF ANGIOSPERMS
