Robert F. Inger

Robert F. Inger (2005)

Robert Frederick Inger (born September 10, 1920 in St. Louis , Missouri , † April 12, 2019 in Chicago , Illinois ), often referred to in publications as Robert F. Inger , was an American herpetologist .

Life

Robert Inger was the son of Jacob Inger and Anna Bourd. In 1946 he married Mary Lee Ballew, who died of cancer in 1985. In 1991 he married Tan Fui Lian.

Inger's high school biology teacher was Julian Alfred Steyermark , who was the curator of botany at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago . Steyermark's influence brought Inger to the Field Museum, where Karl Patterson Schmidt , Delbert Dwight Davis, and Clifford H. Pope became his mentors. As a result of his work at the museum, Inger had written or co-authored five publications before he graduated from high school. Inger received a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Chicago in 1942 .

After graduating, Inger wanted to volunteer with the United States Army Corps of Engineers because the Army Corps for engineers had piqued his interest after a summer course in aerial surveying at the university. However, he was rejected because of his poor eyesight. Soon afterwards he was drafted, where he was already employed in the army corps of engineers. As a unit of General George S. Patton's army in France and Germany, his company made maps from the ground. Since she was stationed on the fringes of the main campaign, Inger's unit was never directly involved in combat missions.

In 1945, Inger retired from the Army and returned to the University of Chicago. His main mentor was Karl Patterson Schmidt, who encouraged him to write his dissertation on the systematics and zoogeography of the Philippine amphibians and to study the extensive collection at the Field Museum of Natural History. Schmidt gave Inger a position as assistant curator of the fish department, which he held from 1949 to 1953. Inger received his doctorate in 1954 and when Clifford Pope went to California prematurely that year, Inger succeeded him as curator at the Department of Amphibians and Reptiles . In 1950 Inger made his first expedition to Borneo. In the course of his career 22 more trips to Borneo followed, the last one in 2001. He also did fieldwork in Malaysia , Thailand , India , China , Brunei and in Zaire . A substantial part of the collections of the Herpetological Department of the Field Museum consists of specimens that Inger had collected. Through his field work in Borneo alone, over 41,500 samples were added to the department. Inger's collections contain extremely large series that are provided with detailed field notes. He retired in September 1994. He then remained associated with the museum as a curator emeritus.

In 1957, Inger's best-known book Living Reptiles of the World was published in collaboration with Karl Patterson Schmidt Inger , which was translated into several languages, including German under the title Knauer's Tierreich in Farben: Reptilien .

Between 1954 and 2009 Inger described around 102 amphibian and reptile species.

Awards and dedication names

In 2002 Robert Inger received the Fitch Award from the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists . The genera Ingerophrynus and Ingerana as well as the species Ameerega ingeri , Limnonectes ingeri , Ptychadena ingeri , Philautus ingeri , Strabomantis ingeri and Pelophryne ingeri are named after Inger . In 2019 the gecko species Cnenaspis ingerorum was named after Robert Inger and his wife Tan Fui Lian Inger.

Fonts (selection)

• Living Reptiles of the World (with Karl Patterson Schmidt), 1957 (German translation Knaurs Tierreich in Farben: Reptilien by Hans Wermuth, Droemer Knaur, 1969)
• The Fresh-Water Fishes of North Borneo (with Chin Phui Kong), Fieldiana: Zoology, Vol. 45, 1962
• The Reptiles , 1966
• The Frogs of Sabah (with Robert B. Stuebing ), 1989
• The Natural History of Amphibians and Reptiles in Sabah (with Tan Fui Lian), 1996
• A Field Guide to the Frogs of Borneo (with Robert B. Stuebing), 1997
• A Field Guide to the Snakes of Borneo (with Robert B. Stuebing), 1999
• A Field Guide to the Frogs of Borneo (2nd edition with Robert B. Stuebing), 2005
• Natural History Of Amphibians And Reptiles In Sabah (2nd edition with Tan Fui Lian), 2010

literature

• Margaret M. Stewart, Sharon Emerson: Robert Frederick Inger . Copeia 2002 (3). American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (ASIH). August 15, 2002, pp. 873-877.
• Bo Beolens, Michael Watkins, Michael Grayson: The Eponym Dictionary of Amphibians. Pelagic Publishing, Exeter, 2013. ISBN 978-1-907807-41-1 , pp. 101-102

Web links

• Employee profile at the Field Museum of Natural History
• A Tribute to Robert F. Inger on his 90th Birthday

Individual evidence

1. ^ Robert F. "Bob" Inger. In: legacy.com. Chicago Tribune , April 28, 2019, accessed June 6, 2019.