Paul Carpenter Standley (March 21, 1884 – June 2, 1963) was an American botanist known for his work on neotropical plants. __TOC__ Standley was born on March 21, 1884 in

Avalon, Missouri Avalon is an unincorporated community in southern Livingston County, Missouri, United States. It is located on Missouri Route H, approximately one mile east of U.S. Route 65 and ten miles southeast of Chillicothe. Avalon was platted in 1869. The ...

. He attended Drury College in Springfield, Missouri and New Mexico State College, where he received a bachelor's degree in 1907, and received a master's degree from New Mexico State College in 1908. He remained at New Mexico State College as an assistant from 1908–1909. He was the Assistant Curator of the Division of Plants at the United States National Museum from 1909 to 1922. In spring, 1928, he took a position at the

Field Museum of Natural History The Field Museum of Natural History (FMNH), also known as The Field Museum, is a natural history museum in Chicago, Illinois, and is one of the largest such museums in the world. The museum is popular for the size and quality of its educational ...

in Chicago, where worked until 1950. While at the Field Museum he did fieldwork in Guatemala between 1938 and 1941. After his retirement in 1950, he moved to the '' Escuela Agricola Panamericana,'' where he worked in the library and herbarium and did field work until 1956, when he stopped doing botanical work. In 1957 he moved to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, where he died on June 2, 1963. He contributed to the ''Trees and Shrubs of Mexico, Flora of Guatemala'', and ''Flora of Costa Rica''.

Family

His sister Penelope "Nellie" Standley was also a botanical collector.

Honours

Three genera of plants have been named after him; in 1932, botanist Alexander Curt Brade published ''

Standleya ''Standleya'' is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the family Rubiaceae. It is native to eastern Brazil. The genus name of ''Standleya'' is in honour of Paul Carpenter Standley Paul Carpenter Standley (March 21, 1884 – June 2, 1963) ...

'', which is a genus of flowering plants from Brazil, belonging to the family Rubiaceae. Then in 1971, botanists R.M. King & H. Rob. published ''

Standleyanthus ''Standleyanthus'' is a genus of Central American plants in the tribe Eupatorieae within the family Asteraceae.D.J.N.Hind & H.E.Robinson. 2007. Tribe Eupatorieae In: ''The Families and Genera of Vascular Plants'' vol.VIII. (Joachim W.Kadereit & C ...

'', which is a genus of Central American plants in the boneset tribe within the sunflower family. Lastly in 1993, botanist Frank Almeda published ''

Stanmarkia ''Stanmarkia'' is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the family Melastomataceae. It is native to south-eastern Mexico and Guatemala. The genus name of ''Stanmarkia'' is in honour of 2 American botanists; Paul Carpenter Standley (1884–196 ...

'', which is a genus of flowering plants from Mexico and Guatemala, belonging to the family Melastomataceae. The name also honours another American botanist Julian Alfred Steyermark (1909–1988).

References

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External links

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Standley's botanical collecting notebooks vol.1
in Field Museum Digital Collections
more volumes
{{DEFAULTSORT:Standley, Paul Carpenter Orchidologists 1884 births 1963 deaths Botanists active in Central America People associated with the Field Museum of Natural History New Mexico State University alumni People from Livingston County, Missouri 20th-century American botanists