Illustration by Diana Rome Peebles,
1998
Louis Agassiz (1807-1873) was a famous Swiss-born ichthyologist (i.e., a scientist who studied fish) who taught at Harvard University as professor of natural history. He founded the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology and served as its director from 1859 until his death in 1873. It is also known today as The Agassiz Museum. He was well known, among other things, for his insistence on close, first-hand observation.
For more on Louis Agassiz, please click on one of the links below:
Link One: Agassiz Biography - Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology
Link Two: Agassiz Biography - Univ. of California (Berkeley) Museum of Paleontology
For more on the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology (a.k.a. The Agassiz Museum), please click here.
Samuel H. Scudder (1837-1911) was a famous entymologist (i.e., a scientist who studies insects). He wrote several authoritative works on insects, and was an assistant to Louis Agassiz early in his career (1862-64).
For more on Samuel Scudder, please click here.
Versions of Scudder's Story
For other versions of Samuel Scudder's story, please click on one of the
following links:
Nathaniel Southgate Shaler (1841-1906) was a student of Louis Agassiz in his undergraduate training at Harvard University in 1859-62. He later became professor of paleontology and geology at Harvard, the first dean of the Harvard Graduate School, and the president of the Geological Society of America.
For more on Nathaniel Shaler, please click on one of the links below:
Link One: Shaler Biography - John Alroy notes
Versions of Shaler's Story
For other versions of Nathaniel Shaler's story, please click on one of the
following links:
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Illustration by Diana Rome Peebles,
1998
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The haemulons that Agassiz made his students study are real fish, from the family called haemulidae, also known as "grunts" (white grunts, blue grunts, etc.), for a grunting noise that they make.