Clinton Hart Merriam

Clinton Hart Merriam
Born	December 5, 1855(1855-12-05) New York City
Died	March 19, 1942(1942-03-19) (aged 86) Berkeley, California
Nationality	USA
Fields	Zoology Ornithology Ethnography
Institutions	United States Department of Agriculture National Geographic Society
Known for	Life zone concept

Clinton Hart Merriam (December 5, 1855-March 19, 1942) was an American zoologist, ornithologist, entomologist and ethnographer.

Known as "Hart" to his friends, Dr. Clinton Hart Merriam was born in New York City in 1855. His father, Clinton Levi Merriam, was a U.S. congressman. He studied biology and anatomy at Yale University and went on to obtain an M.D. from the School of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia University in 1879 and taught at Harvard University for a period of time. His sister Florence Augusta Merriam Bailey was a pioneering ornithologist who introduced the idea of popular field guides for bird identification. Florence Merriam married Vernon Bailey a field naturalist a long-time collecting partner of C. Hart Merriam's. He died in Berkeley, California in 1942.

Zoology

In 1886, he became the first chief of the Division of Economic Ornithology and Mammalogy of the United States Department of Agriculture, predecessor to the National Wildlife Research Center and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. He was one of the original founders of the National Geographic Society in 1888. He developed the concept of "life zones" to classify biomes found in North America along an altitudinal sequence corresponding to the zonal latitudinal sequence from Equator to Pole. In mammalogy, he is known as an excessive splitter, proposing, for example, tens of different species of North American brown bears in several genera.

In 1899, he helped railroad magnate E. H. Harriman to organize an exploratory voyage along the Alaska coastline.

Some species of animals that bear his name are Merriam's Wild Turkey Meliagris gallopavo meriami, the now extinct Merriam's Elk Cervus elaphus merriami, and Merriam's Chipmunk Tamias merriami. Much of his detail-oriented taxonomy continues to be influential within mammalogical and ornithological circles.^{[citation needed]}

Native Americans

Later in life, funded by the Harriman family, Merriam's focus shifted to studying and assisting the Native American tribes in the western United States. His contributions on the myths of central California and on ethnogeography were particularly noteworthy.

See also

• C. Hart Merriam Base Camp Site

References

• Bean, Lowell John. 1993. "Introduction". In The Dawn of the World: Myths and Tales of the Miwok Indians of California, by C. Hart Merriam, pp. 1-12. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln.
• Kroeber, A. L. 1955. "C. Hart Merriam as Anthropologist". In Studies of California Indians, by C. Hart Merriam, pp. vii-xiv. University of California Press, Berkeley.
• Sterling, Keir B. 1974. The Last of the Naturalists: The Career of C. Hart Merriam. Arno Press, New York.
• Anon. 1942 [Merriam, C. H.] Ent. News 53:150
• Anon. 1942 [Merriam, C. H.] Science 95: 318
• Daubunnire, R. F. 1938: [Merriam, C. H.]. Quart. Rev. Biol. 13:327-332

External links

• C. Hart Merriam, Dawn of the World: Myths and Weird Tales Told by the Mewan Indians of California (1910)
• C. Hart Merriam, “Indian Village and Camp Sites in Yosemite Valley,” Sierra Club Bulletin (1917)
• USDA Merriam National Wildlife Research Center
• BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR OF CLINTON HART MERRIAM
• C. Hart Merriam Collection of Native American Photographs, ca. 1890-1938 at The Bancroft Library
• Guide to the C. Hart Merriam Papers, Volume 1 and Volume 2 at The Bancroft Library
• C. Hart Merriam Collection at Princeton University

Persondata
Name	Merriam, Clinton Hart
Alternative names
Short description	American zoologist and ornithologist
Date of birth	December 5, 1855
Place of birth	New York City
Date of death	March 19, 1942
Place of death	Berkeley, California