Fielding Bradford Meek

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Drawings of mollusks ; Illustration by Fielding Bradford Meek

Fielding Bradford Meek (born December 10, 1817 in Madison , Indiana , † December 22, 1876 in Washington, DC ) was an American geologist and paleontologist.

Fielding Bradford Meek was born to a lawyer in Madison, Indiana. His ancestors came from Ireland. When he was three years old, his father died. Like many of his later colleagues, Meek learned his extensive scientific knowledge autodidactically . During his childhood and youth he mainly collected and studied fossils . After finishing school he learned a commercial profession before embarking on a scientific career.

From 1848 he worked for the United States Geological Survey in Iowa and then in Wisconsin and Minnesota . From 1852 to 1858 he worked as an assistant to the American paleontologist James Hall in Albany , New York . In 1853, on behalf of Hall, he and Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden examined the badlands in South Dakota and Nebraska and brought back a rich selection of valuable fossils. In 1858 he went to Washington DC to the Smithsonian Institution . He died of tuberculosis on December 22, 1876 in Washington DC .

Meek was a member of numerous learned societies; at the National Academy of Sciences (1869), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1865) and at the Megatherium Club founded by William Stimpson . With his colleague Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden, he published several scientific papers.

Publications

A selection of his catalog raisonné:

  • Descriptions of New Species of Gastropoda and Cephalopoda from the Cretaceous Formations of Nebraska Territory (1856); together with Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden
  • Descriptions of New Organic Remains from the Cretaceous Rocks of Vancouver's Island (1858)
  • Check-List of the Invertebrate Fossils of North America; Cretaceous and Jurassic (1864)
  • Paleontology of the Upper Missouri (1865); together with Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden
  • Descriptions and Illustrations of Fossils from Vancouver's and Sucia Islands and other Northwestern Localities (1876)

Web links

Commons : Fielding Bradford Meek  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1]
personal data
SURNAME Meek, Fielding Bradford
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American geologist and paleontologist
DATE OF BIRTH December 10, 1817
PLACE OF BIRTH Madison , Indiana
DATE OF DEATH December 22, 1876
Place of death Washington, DC