Henry Allan Gleason (botanist)

Henry Allan Gleason (born January 2, 1882 in Dalton City , Illinois , † April 12, 1975 in New York City ) was an American botanist and ecologist . One of his specialties was the systematics of the black mouth family (Melastomataceae). Its official botanical author abbreviation is " Gleason ".

Life

He began botanical studies at the age of 13, which he then published in The American Naturalist magazine. He studied at the University of Illinois, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Arts. After a year as a lecturer at the University of Ohio and a summer as a zoologist , studying invertebrates while studying the Isle Royale , a University of Michigan scholarship supported him in taxonomic studies under Nathaniel Lord Britton at Columbia University . There he received his doctorate in 1906.

After a few years as a lecturer at the universities of Illinois and Michigan , he undertook field studies of tropical vegetation in the Philippines , Java and Ceylon . He reported it to the Torrey Botanical Club in 1918 , and immediately thereafter Nathaniel Lord Britton offered him a job at the New York Botanical Garden, which Gleason held for 30 years.

He filled the positions of curator , senior custodian and deputy director. He was the editor of the Garden Journal , Addisonia and the Bulletin of the New York Botanical Garden . It is thanks to him that the volumes of the North American Flora and the Plants of the Vicinity of New York have been edited, revised and expanded . He officially retired in 1950 and wrote two unpublished books: The Short and Simple Annals of Henry A. Gleason and Thumbnail Sketches of Botanists , which are kept in the archives of the New York Botanical Garden.

His eldest son, Henry Allan Gleason Jr (1917-2007), was a linguist at the University of Toronto . His younger son, Andrew Gleason (1921-2008), was a mathematician at Harvard University.

Works (selection)

Gleason wrote over 235 articles and books. As one of the first ecologists he endeavored to research the phylogeny and history of the spread of plant groups by combining morphological and geographical data. Most formative were his work on the individualistic concept of plant communities - "Of the various species which reach one spot of ground, the local environment determines which may live, depending on the individual physiological demands of each species separately", "every species of plant is a law unto itself ”, the vegetation of a place no more than a“ juxtaposition of individuals ”- and the continuum hypothesis.

• The flora of the prairies. BS thesis. University of Illinois. 1901.
• A botanical survey of the Illinois River Valley sand region. Ill. State Lab. Nat. Hist. Bull. 7: 149-194. 1907.
• On the biology of the sand areas of Illinois. II. A botanical survey of the Illinois River Valley sand region. Ill. Lab. Nat. Hist. Bull. 7: 149-194. 1907.
• A virgin prairie in Illinois. Ill. Acad. Sci., Trans. 1:62. 1908.
• The vegetational history of a river dune. Ill. Acad. Sci., Trans. 2: 19-26. 1909.
• Some Unsolved Problems of the Prairies. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 36 (5): 265-271. 1909.
• The vegetation of the inland sand deposits of Illinois. Ill. Lab. Nat. Hist. Bull. 9: 23-174. 1910.
• An Isolated Prairie Grove and Its Phytogeographical Significance. Botanical Gazette 53 (1): 38-49. 1912.
• HA Gleason & Frank C. Gates: A Comparison of the Rates of Evaporation in Certain Associations in Central Illinois. Botanical Gazette 53 (6): 478-491. 1912.
• The Structure and Development of the Plant Association. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 43: 463-481. 1917.
• On the relation between species and area. Ecology 3 (2): 158-162. 1922.
• The Vegetational History of the Middle West. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 12: 39-85. 1922.
• Species and Area. Ecology 6 (1): 66-74. 1925.
• The Individualistic Concept of the Plant Association. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 53: 7-26. 1926.
• Further Views on the Succession Concept. Ecology 8 (3): 299-326. 1927.
• Is Sunusia an Association? Ecology 17 (3): 444-451. 1936.
• The Individualistic Concept of the Plant Association. American Midland Naturalist 21 (1): 92-110. 1939.
• The new Britton and Brown illustrated flora of the northeastern United States and adjacent Canada . 3rd ed., New York, 1963.
• The natural geography of plants . New York, 1964
• Delving into the History of American Ecology. Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 56 (4): 7-10. 1975.
• Arthur Cronquist & HA Gleason: Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada . 2nd edition 1991

Honors

The plant genus Gleasonia Standl was named after him . from the family of the redness plants (Rubiaceae) and Neogleasonia Maguire from the family of Clusiaceae named.

Individual evidence

1. ^ RK Brummitt, CE Powell: Authors of Plant Names . Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew , 1992, ISBN 1-84246-085-4 .
2. ↑ New York Botanical Garden's biography (Engl.) ( Memento of the original March 4, 2016 Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link is automatically inserted and not yet tested. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ↑ New York Botanical Garden, Influence on Plant Sociology ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
4. ^ Gleason: The Individualistic Concept of the Plant Association. American Midland Naturalist 21 (1), 1939: 92-110, here 107f.
5. ^ Gleason: The Individualistic Concept of the Plant Association. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 53, 1926: 7-26, here: 26.
6. ^ Gleason: The Individualistic Concept of the Plant Association. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 53, 1926: 7-26, here: 25.
7. ^ Robert P. McIntosh: HA Gleason - "Individualistic Ecologist" 1882-1975: His Contributions to Ecological Theory. Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 102 (5): 253-273. 1975.
8. ↑ Lotte Burkhardt: Directory of eponymous plant names . Extended Edition. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin, Free University Berlin Berlin 2018. [1]

Web links

• Author entry and list of the plant names described for Henry Allan Gleason (botanist) at the IPNI