Umaldy Theodore Waterfall

Umaldy Theodore Waterfall (born August 13, 1910 in Frederick , Oklahoma , † October 27, 1971 in Stillwater , Oklahoma) was an American botanist . Its official botanical author abbreviation is “ Waterf. ".

Waterfall received his B.Sc. from Oklahoma A & M , then studied botany at the University of Oklahoma in Norman , where he initially received his M.Sc. Title and his PhD in 1956 . His doctoral thesis was a monograph on the genus of the bladder cherries ( Physalis ) from the nightshade family .

His main research area was the flora of the state of Oklahoma , about which he published more than 30 articles in scientific journals. Some of these publications appeared as a collection under the title "Studies in the Composition and Distribution of the Oklahoma Flora". 1952 "A Catalog of the Flora of Oklahoma" was published, in whose creation Waterfall played a key role.

In 1965 he received a grant from the National Science Foundation to research the genus Physalis in Mexico , Central America, and the West Indies . To this end, he visited, among other things, a large number of European herbaria , in which he studied specimens of the Physalis species. The results of these investigations were published in the journal Rhodora from 1967 .

For the last 10 years of his life, Waterfall has had severe health problems. During that time he underwent five major operations, suffered two heart attacks and several attacks of severe kidney infections. He died on October 27, 1971 after a long illness in Stillwater Municipal Hospital.

Waterfall had been married to La Clida Cotter since July 24, 1935, and they had three children together.

supporting documents

• Jack W. Stanford: Umaldy T. Waterfall (1910-1971) . In: Rhodora , Volume 75, New England Botanical Club, Oxford, 1973. pp. 146-149.

Web links

• Author entry and list of the described plant names for Umaldy Theodore Waterfall at the IPNI