Albert Pitts Morse (February 10, 1863 – April 29, 1936) was an American entomologist who specialized in the

Orthoptera Orthoptera () is an order of insects that comprises the grasshoppers, locusts, and crickets, including closely related insects, such as the bush crickets or katydids and wētā. The order is subdivided into two suborders: Caelifera – grassh ...

of North America. Morse was born to Leonard Townsend of

Sherborn, Massachusetts Sherborn is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. Located in Boston's MetroWest region, is in area code 508 and has the ZIP code 01770. As of the 2020 U.S. Census, the town population was 4,401. Sherborn shares its highly ...

and Phebe Adaline Knapp. His paternal ancestors included

Samuel Morse Samuel Finley Breese Morse (April 27, 1791 – April 2, 1872) was an American inventor and painter. After having established his reputation as a portrait painter, in his middle age Morse contributed to the invention of a single-wire telegraph ...

of Dedham. He went to local schools and graduated from Sawin Academy in 1879. He took an interest in the natural world, influenced by naturalists like Amory L. Babcock, Edgar J. Smith and William Edwards. He farmed for a while and after 1888 he joined

Wellesley College Wellesley College is a private women's liberal arts college in Wellesley, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1870 by Henry and Pauline Durant as a female seminary, it is a member of the original Seven Sisters Colleges, an unofficial g ...

as an assistant in the zoology department with which he remained associated until 1933. He attended a summer school in entomology at

Woods Hole Woods Hole is a census-designated place in the town of Falmouth in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. It lies at the extreme southwest corner of Cape Cod, near Martha's Vineyard and the Elizabeth Islands. The population was 781 at ...

under Professor J.H. Comstock and took an interest in the Orthoptera of New England. He made collection trips to the Pacific Coast, encouraged by S.H. Scudder, and returned with thousands of specimens from which several new species were described. He conducted field courses for biology teachers around 1901 and he served as a research assistant at the Carnegie Institution, Washington in 1903 and 1905. In 1911, he became a curator in charge of the insects in the Peabody Museum in Salem and worked until 1926. He was married to Annie McGill of Dover from 1893 and they had two children. Morse died in Wellesley after three years of poor health.

References

External links

Gravestone at Pine Hill Cemetery

Manual of the Orthoptera of New England, including the locusts, grasshoppers, crickets, and their allies (1920)

Orthoptera of Maine (1921)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Morse, Albert Pitts 1863 births 1936 deaths American entomologists People from Sherborn, Massachusetts