Albert Spear Hitchcock (September 4, 1865 – December 16, 1935) was an American

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

and agrostologist. Hitchcock graduated from the Iowa Agricultural College with bachelor's degree in 1884 and M.S. in 1886. From 1892 to 1901 he was a professor of botany at the Kansas State Agricultural College. Hitchcock joined the USDA in 1901 as Assistant Agrostologist under Frank Lamson-Scribner. In 1905 he was put in charge of the grass herbarium and became Systematic Agrostologist. After 1928, he held the title of Principal Biologist in charge of Systematic Agrostology of the Department of Agriculture and kept that title until his death in 1935. In 1912 he became Custodian of Grasses, Division of Plants,

United States National Museum The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

. Hitchcock remained Custodian without remuneration until his death. His field notebooks are archived in the Smithsonian Institution. He was a professor of botany in the Kansas State Agricultural College and authored over 250 works during his lifetime.

Contributions to science

The Hitchcock-Chase Collection consists of 2,707 drawings (mostly ink, but some pencil) of grasses, representing hundreds of genera, that were assembled by the Smithsonian Institution agrostologists Albert Spear Hitchcock (1865–1935) and

Mary Agnes Chase Mary Agnes Chase (1869–1963) was an American botanist who specialized in agrostology, the study of grasses. Although lacking formal education past elementary school, Chase was able to rise through the ranks as a botanist at the United States De ...

(1869–1963). The collection is on indefinite loan to

Hunt Institute The Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation (HIBD), dedicated as the Rachel McMasters Miller Hunt Botanical Library in 1961, is a research division of Carnegie Mellon University. History HIBD is named for Rachel McMasters Miller Hunt. She don ...

from the Smithsonian.

Works

Manual of the Grasses of the West Indies
– Miscellaneous Publication #243, United States Department of Agriculture, Washington DC (1936)
Manual of the grasses of the United States
– Miscellaneous Publication #200, United States Department of Agriculture, Washington DC (1935)
A Manual of Farm Grasses
(1921)
A.S. Hitchcock Field Books, a set on Flickr

References

External links

* * * American taxonomists 1865 births 1935 deaths Agrostologists Smithsonian Institution people United States Department of Agriculture officials Botanical Society of America Kansas State University faculty 19th-century American botanists 20th-century American botanists {{US-botanist-stub