Theodore Gill

Theodore Nicholas Gill ( born March 21, 1837 in New York City; † September 25, 1914 in Washington) was an American ichthyologist. For over 50 years he was an associate member of the Smithsonian Institution.

Life

Theodore Nicholas Gill was born in a house on Broadway in Manhattan, but soon moved into the Grand Street, on the edge of the then only 300,000 inhabitants city where already started the free nature landscape with fields and forests.

His father appointed his son to a career as a clergyman and sent him after he had attended a prestigious Grammar School a short time to a private tutor to secure him a good education, especially in classical philology. After Theodore Nicholas Gill's mother died, his father remarried and moved to Brooklyn. The young Theodore visited from this point back to school in the city and had daily by ferry from Brooklyn go to the mainland, where he. Near the international port at one of the largest fish markets in the world, the Fulton Fish Market passed, His interest in the fish was soon awakened to a scientific career was not thinking in that situation for him.

Gill decided therefore to avoid the unpopular career as a clergyman, and to begin a study of the law in order later to stay with an uncle in a law firm. His real interests, however, were devoted to the science and nature.

The study of science at that time offered few opportunities for employment, but Gill was awarded a scholarship at the Wagner Free Institute in Philadelphia PA where he was able to pursue his interests. He began to expand his scientific acquaintances, and met in 1856 mollusc zoologist William Stimpson ( 1832-1872 ) in New York, the expedition had just returned from the North Pacific Exploring and worked at the Smithsonian. Stimpson returned to Washington and told Spencer Fullerton Baird (1823-1887) about the young scientists. Baird and Gill were known through correspondence with each other, and Baird arranged the publication Gill's report on the fishes of New York in the Smithsonian Annual Report 1856. In December the following year Gill traveled to Washington to prepare for his expedition to the Caribbean. There he met Baird personally and then the Secretary of the Smithsonian Joseph Henry ( 1797-1878 ). That was the beginning of a lifelong membership at the Smithsonian Institution.

Gill came back with an important collection from the Caribbean, partly with sea fishing out of Trinidad. In August 1858 he went to Washington to work up his collection, which is deposited at the Smithsonian. In 1859 he undertook a second tour, this time to Newfoundland to help his grandfather in the construction of his estate. These two trips were the only significant field work he has ever undertaken. The rest of his career, he spent studying the ever-growing collections of the Museum.

After returning from Newfoundland Gill was chosen by Baird to help in dealing with the results of the Northwest Boundary Survey. 1862 Gill was employed as manager of the Smithsonian 's library. When this library in 1866 in the Library of Congress (Washington) integrated, Gill was taken and later used as an Assistant, Senior Assistant Librarian of Congress, he had held this post until 1874. In addition to his career at the Smithsonian, he was very long scientific member of the Columbian College in Washington, now George Washington University. There, Gill began in 1860 as deputy professor and lecturer in 1864, 1884 and finally in 1910 Professor emeritus professor. During this time he earned from the University four academic degrees:

Nevertheless, Gill was a little inspired lecturer and showed little interest in administrative matters or day in day out work on the collections. In fact, he has given early Baird to understand in his career that he wanted nothing more to do after a triple change in the Smithsonian 's collections fish with it. Gill was a prolific author, he gave more than 500 manuscripts in his long career out. The main issue was the fact to fish ( 388 ), but he also wrote about birds, mammals and molluscs, as well as theoretical and general biology. For a time he edited the ornithological magazine The Osprey. Gill was very interested in the relationships between animals and taxonomy. He used osteology and other similar sciences in his studies. As a result, Gill's works had a very unique aspect to it than other taxonomic descriptions in this era. His work is always based on careful observations, but they were all kept short and concise. He preferred, first time to work in smaller groups, and to bring the results afterwards on paper. Many of his earlier manuscripts were published in the Annals of the New York Lyceum of Natural History ( the Lyceum he joined in 1858 ) and the Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia ( the Academy chose him in 1860 to correspondents ). After the publication of the Proceedings of the United States National Museum started in 1878, published most of Gill's manuscripts there. Among the most influential works was his taxonomy of fish ( 1872), the basis of which were the Smithsonian 's fish collections and even then served for many years as a template most ichthyologists.

Though Gill never married and spent much time in his property of the Smithsonian Institution, he was by no means a hermit. He shared his life in science and society evenly. He was a member of many scientific societies, such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science ( Washington), which he chaired in 1897 as president. In 1873 he was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences (Washington). Gill was very honored and respected by his colleagues. David Starr Jordan Gill had even deified with respect, so he called him the Master of Taxonomy and the most passionate performers taxonomic facts, there has ever been in the history of ichthyology. Gill voluntarily sacrificed his time to stand his scientific colleagues and the public with his knowledge in word and deed to the side. He created products in encyclopedias and other public works, among other things, he gave an interview to the Washington Post about saltwater fish. By a stroke weakened Gill spent his last years quietly in Washington, where he died on 25 September 1914.

Works

• Catalogue of the fishes of the eastern coast of North America, from Greenland to Georgia. Philadelphia, 1861.
• Material for a bibliography of North American mammals. Washington in 1877.
• Günther 's literature and morphography of fishes. Forest and Stream, New York, 1881.
• Addresses in memory of Edward Drinker Cope. Philadelphia 1897.
• A remarkable genus of fishes, the umbras. Smithsonian, Washington, 1904.
• Angler fishes. , 1909.
• Notes on the structure and habits of the wolf fishes. Washington 1911.