Edward Oscar Ulrich

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Edward Oscar Ulrich (born February 1, 1857 in Covington , Kentucky , † February 22, 1944 in Washington, DC ) was an American paleontologist .

Scientific career

Ulrich showed an interest in fossils in his youth and collected in the fossil-rich rock strata around his hometown of Covington, Kentucky. In 1872, at the age of 15, he hired himself out for two years as a laborer in the construction of the Eden Park Reservoir in Cincinnati in order to be able to look for fossils in the Eden Shales . He continued his education at German Wallace and Baldwin College in Berea , Ohio , and Ohio Medical College in Cincinnati , but failed to graduate from either school due to his many extra-curricular interests. The German Wallace and Baldwin College later awarded him an AM in 1886 and a Ph.D. in 1892. for his scientific merits. In 1877 he became a curator of the Cincinnati Society of Natural History , although without a degree . During this time he met Charles Schuchert , who worked in his father's carpentry workshop and, like Ulrich, was a mostly self-taught fossil enthusiast.

In 1880 Ulrich turned his back on science for a short time and became superintendent of the Little Caribou Silver Mines near Boulder , Colorado . In 1883 he returned to Cincinnati and worked there for 14 years as a freelance geologist and paleontologist as well as an illustrator for geological monographs , first together with Schuchert, then alone when he went east in 1889 to do his own in Albany under the paleontologist James Hall great scientific career to begin. Ulrich's employers during this period included the State Geological Surveys of Illinois , Minnesota , Ohio and Kentucky . In 1897 Ulrich was hired as a geologist for the United States Geological Survey (USGS). He stayed here until his retirement in 1932. After 1932 he continued his studies as a research fellow at the United States National Museum until his death.

Scientific merits and honors

Ulrich was "... the greatest descriptive paleontologist America has ever produced." He was a specialist in paleozoic invertebrates , specializing primarily in moss animals , mussels and conodonts . Among his more than 120 publications is the classic work Revision of the Paleozoic System from 1911. Ulrich undertook extensive geological fieldwork in most of the Paleozoic formations east of the Rocky Mountains and between 1922 and 1931 six research trips to Europe.

He founded the superfamily Cycloconchoidea ULRICH in 1894 in the zoological system of mussels in the superordinate order of the Palaeoheterodonta .

In addition to his research, Ulrich was a member of the Geological Society of America , President of the Paleontological Society and a member of the National Academy of Sciences . In 1932 he was awarded the Penrose Medal of the Geological Society of America, and in 1930 he received the Mary Clark Thompson Medal of the National Academy of Sciences.

Fonts

  • with WH Scofield: The Lower Silurian Lamellibranchiata of Minnesota . In: EO Ulrich, WH Scofield, JM Clarke, & NH Winchell, (Eds.), Final Report of the Geological and Natural History Survey of Minnesota, vol. 3, part 2, The Geology of Minnesota. Paleontology. 1894, pp. 475-628, plates 35-46

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ruedemann 1947, p. 260
  2. ^ William Cox: Edward Oscar Ulrich Papers. Historical note.
personal data
SURNAME Ulrich, Edward Oscar
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American paleontologist
DATE OF BIRTH February 1, 1857
PLACE OF BIRTH Covington
DATE OF DEATH February 22, 1944
Place of death Washington, DC