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 ...

Claremont Graduate University The Claremont Graduate University (CGU) is a private, all-graduate research university in Claremont, California. Founded in 1925, CGU is a member of the Claremont Colleges which includes five undergraduate (Pomona College, Claremont McKenna Co ...

Claremont, California Claremont () is a suburban city on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County, California, United States, east of downtown Los Angeles. It is in the Pomona Valley, at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. As of the 2010 census it had a popul ...

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (), commonly called angiosperms. The term "angiosperm" is derived from the Greek words ('container, vessel') and ('seed'), and refers to those plants th ...

Spring Lake, New Jersey Spring Lake is a borough situated on the Jersey Shore in Monmouth County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2010 United States census, the borough's population was 2,993,Gulfport and

St. Petersburg, Florida St. Petersburg is a city in Pinellas County, Florida, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 258,308, making it the fifth-most populous city in Florida and the second-largest city in the Tampa Bay Area, after Tampa. It is the ...

.Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden Library. "Finding Aid for the Robert Folger Thorne Papers 1905-1988" (2009), p. 1. He graduated summa cum laude in 1941 with a major in

botany 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 w ...

from

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native A ...

and earned his M.S. degree in economic botany in 1942 at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

.Hamilton, Clement W. "Robert F. Thorne - Recipient of the 2001 Asa Gray Award", ''Systematic Botany''(2002), 27(1): p. 2. He spent about three years serving in the armed forces during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, first at

Hondo Hondo may refer to: Places * Rio Hondo (disambiguation), the name of several locations, derived from the Spanish word for "deep" Canada * Hondo, Alberta, an unincorporated community United States * Hondo, New Mexico, an unincorporated co ...

Navigation School,

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

, graduating as a second lieutenant in aerial navigation in 1943. Then, after 7 months in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

in 1944 as a

B-24 bomber The Consolidated B-24 Liberator is an American heavy bomber, designed by Consolidated Aircraft of San Diego, California. It was known within the company as the Model 32, and some initial production aircraft were laid down as export models des ...

navigator with 40 missions over eastern and southern Europe, he served as an instructor and as an examinations officer at

Ellington Field Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base is a joint installation shared by various active component and reserve component military units, as well as aircraft flight operations of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) under the aegis ...

, Texas, from 1944 to 1945.Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden Library. "Finding Aid for the Robert Folger Thorne Papers 1905-1988" (2009), p. 2. After serving in the armed forces, he earned his Ph.D. in economic botany at Cornell University in 1949, studying under professors Walter Muenscher and Arthur Eames. While at Cornell, he met and married Mae Zukel in 1947. Bob Thorne died on Tuesday, March 24, 2015, at the age of 94.

Work

Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden

Thorne was the assistant professor of botany at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is org ...

,

Iowa City, Iowa Iowa City, offically the City of Iowa City is a city in Johnson County, Iowa, United States. It is the home of the University of Iowa and county seat of Johnson County, at the center of the Iowa City Metropolitan Statistical Area. At the time ...

, from 1949 to 1953, associate professor from 1954 to 1960, and professor from 1961 to 1962. He was a visiting professor at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

,

Lake Itasca Lake Itasca is a small glacial lake, approximately in area. Located in southeastern Clearwater County, in the Headwaters area of north central Minnesota, it is notable for being the headwater of the Mississippi River. The lake is in Itasca Sta ...

Biological Station in the summer of 1962 before moving to

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

, where he became

taxonomist In biology, taxonomy () is the scientific study of naming, defining ( circumscribing) and classifying groups of biological organisms based on shared characteristics. Organisms are grouped into taxa (singular: taxon) and these groups are given ...

and

curator A curator (from la, cura, meaning "to take care") is a manager or overseer. When working with cultural organizations, a curator is typically a "collections curator" or an "exhibitions curator", and has multifaceted tasks dependent on the parti ...

for Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden and professor for Claremont Graduate School (now

Claremont Graduate University The Claremont Graduate University (CGU) is a private, all-graduate research university in Claremont, California. Founded in 1925, CGU is a member of the Claremont Colleges which includes five undergraduate (Pomona College, Claremont McKenna Co ...

) in

Claremont, California Claremont () is a suburban city on the eastern edge of Los Angeles County, California, United States, east of downtown Los Angeles. It is in the Pomona Valley, at the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains. As of the 2010 census it had a popul ...

. He became taxonomist and curator emeritus as well as professor emeritus at Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden and Claremont Graduate School in 1987. He also became curator emeritus of the

Pomona College Pomona College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Claremont, California. It was established in 1887 by a group of Congregationalists who wanted to recreate a "college of the New England type" in Southern California. In 1925, it became ...

Herbarium in Claremont, California, from 1990 to the present. Other appointments include: Field Botanist,

U.S. Public Health Service The United States Public Health Service (USPHS or PHS) is a collection of agencies of the Department of Health and Human Services concerned with public health, containing nine out of the department's twelve operating divisions. The Assistant ...

, Georgia, Summer 1946. Botany Assistant, 1945–1947; Instructor in Botany, 1948–1949; Cornell University, Ithaca, New York. Visiting Associate Professor,

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United S ...

, Mountain Lake Biological Station, Summer 1956. Thorne became a Fulbright Research Scholar in 1959 and spent his time as a

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

senior postdoctoral fellow at the

University of Queensland , mottoeng = By means of knowledge and hard work , established = , endowment = A$224.3 million , budget = A$2.1 billion , type = Public research university , chancellor = Peter Varghese , vice_chancellor = Deborah Terry , city = B ...

,

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and studying the plant communities of

New Caledonia ) , anthem = "" , image_map = New Caledonia on the globe (small islands magnified) (Polynesia centered).svg , map_alt = Location of New Caledonia , map_caption = Location of New Caledonia , mapsize = 290px , subdivision_type = Sovereign st ...

,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

, and

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea). It is a simplified version of ...

. When he moved to California in 1962, he quickly learned the flora of California, which led him to write the essay entitled "The vascular plant communities of California" in 1976. According to ''Systematic Botany'', Thorne has advocated for "the conservation of California's endangered natural environments; his advocacy and leadership helped result in the conservation of Santa Catalina Island’s biota." Thorne gained an international reputation through "his contributions to our understanding of the evolution of flowering plants... and that has culminated recently in two... publications, one outlining his classifications of

monocot Monocotyledons (), commonly referred to as monocots, (Lilianae ''sensu'' Chase & Reveal) are grass and grass-like flowering plants (angiosperms), the seeds of which typically contain only one embryonic leaf, or cotyledon. They constitute one of ...

s (Thorne 2000) and the other on the

dicotyledon The dicotyledons, also known as dicots (or, more rarely, dicotyls), are one of the two groups into which all the flowering plants (angiosperms) were formerly divided. The name refers to one of the typical characteristics of the group: namely, t ...

s (Thorne 2001)." Thorne was a guide and teacher for the many staff, students, researchers, and visitors of Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden through the years. Among his projects was completing "floristic works on both the San Gabriel and

San Bernardino San Bernardino (; Spanish language, Spanish for Bernardino of Siena, "Saint Bernardino") is a city and county seat of San Bernardino County, California, United States. Located in the Inland Empire region of Southern California, the city had a ...

mountains," a study of the flora of

Sierra San Pedro Martir Sierra (Spanish for "mountain range" and "saw", from Latin '' serra'') may refer to the following: Places Mountains and mountain ranges * Sierra de Juárez, a mountain range in Baja California, Mexico * Sierra de las Nieves, a mountain range i ...

, and a checklist for the entire Baja peninsula.

Thorne system

Among Thorne's many accomplishments was a system of plant taxonomy known as the

Thorne system A system of plant taxonomy, the Thorne system of plant classification was devised by the American botanist Robert F. Thorne (1920–2015) in 1968, and he continued to issue revisions over many years (1968–2007). Some versions of the system are ...

, first issued in 1968, and periodically revised from 1976 onwards (1977, 1983, 1992, 1999, 2007).

Fellowships and awards

* Cramer Fellow (

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native A ...

to attend

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

, 1941; declined a second Cramer Fellowship in order to enter

Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

). * Research Associate Professor,

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public university, public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is org ...

, 1957. * Fulbright Research Scholar,

University of Queensland , mottoeng = By means of knowledge and hard work , established = , endowment = A$224.3 million , budget = A$2.1 billion , type = Public research university , chancellor = Peter Varghese , vice_chancellor = Deborah Terry , city = B ...

, Brisbane, Australia, 1959–1960 (renewed once). * National Science Foundation Senior Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia; Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and British Museum (Natural History), London, England, 1960. * Elected Foreign Member,

Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters {{Infobox organization , name = The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters , full_name = , native_name = Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskab , native_name_lang = , logo = Royal ...

, 1986–present. * Merit Award, American Botanical Society, 1996. * ''Madroño'', Volume 45, 1999. Dedicated to Robert F. Thorne.

Special recognition

* 1996.

Universidad Autónoma de Baja California The Autonomous University of Baja California (UABC) ( es, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California) is a public institution of higher education in Baja California. Established in 1957, UABC has its headquarters located in the city of Mexicali. T ...

, Ensenada. For botanical contributions in Baja California * 1998. Santa Catalina Island Conservancy. For botanical contributions to Santa Catalina Island * 1999. Southern California Botanists. For botanical contributions in California * 1999. Southern California Botanists. Lifetime Achievement Award * 2000. University Club of Claremont, California * 2001.

American Society of Plant Taxonomists The American Society of Plant Taxonomists (ASPT) is a botanical organization formed in 1935 to "foster, encourage, and promote education and research in the field of plant taxonomy, to include those areas and fields of study that contribute to and b ...

. Asa Gray Award for outstanding contributions in systematic botany * 2003. Third International Conference of the Comparative Biology of Monocotyledons. Lifetime Achievement Award * 2005. Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden. Dedication honoring lifetime achievements as systematist and conservationist * 2006. Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden. California Glory Award acknowledging outstanding contributions toward understanding and preservation of California's native flora * 2006. Botanical Society of America. Centennial Award for exemplary services to the plant sciences

Professional service

Active via elective and appointed offices in service to several professional societies: * President,

American Society of Plant Taxonomists The American Society of Plant Taxonomists (ASPT) is a botanical organization formed in 1935 to "foster, encourage, and promote education and research in the field of plant taxonomy, to include those areas and fields of study that contribute to and b ...

, 1968. * Secretary,

Botanical Society of America The Botanical Society of America (BSA) represents professional and amateur botanists, researchers, educators and students in over 80 countries of the world. It functions as a United States nonprofit 501(c)(3) membership society. History The soci ...

, ca. 1958. * President, Southern California Botanists, ca. 1966. * Second vice-president,

California Botanical Society The California Botanical Society was founded by Willis Linn Jepson in 1913, since when it has advanced the knowledge of botanical sciences in the Western United States Services The society services are: the journal ''Madroño'', published since ...

, ca. 1966. * National treasurer,

Gamma Alpha The Gamma Alpha Graduate Scientific Society () is a non-profit fraternal organization (501(c)(7)) in the United States which fosters interdisciplinary dialogue among graduate students through its local chapters. The Society's chapters have often ...

scientific fraternity, 1954–1957. * Chairman, advisory council of Flora North America Project, which found the project feasible. * On the editorial boards of several national botanical journals; international journal Taiwania. * Reviewer of manuscripts for various botanical journals and university presses.

Selected publications

* * * * * 1986. Thorne, R. F. Antarctic elements in Australasian rainforests. Telopea 2(6): 611–617.Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden Library. "Finding Aid for the Robert Folger Thorne Papers 1905-1988" (2009), p. 3. * * * 1994. Krantz, T. P. and R. F. Thorne. An annotated flora of the vascular plants of the San Bernardino Mountains. (Appendix I: Krantz. A phytogeography of the San Bernardino Mountains, San Bernardino County, California. Ph.D. Thesis, Univ. of Calif., Berkeley. 1994)Robert F Thorne.A Bibliography of Floristics in Southern California. 2. Literature pertinent to local areas
/ref> * 1995. Thorne, R. F. Vascular plants of Fort DeSoto Park, Pinellas County, Florida. Selbyana 16(1): 100–109. * 1999. Thorne, R. F. Eastern Asia as a living museum for archaic angiosperms and other seed plants. Taiwania 44(4): 413–422. * 2000. Thorne, R. F. The classification and geography of the monocotyledon subclasses Alismatidae, Liliidae and Commelinidae, pp. 75–124. In B. Nordenstam, G. E-Ghazaly, and M. Kassas ds. Plant Systematics for the 21st Century. Portland Press, London, UK. * 2001. Thorne, R. F. The classification and geography of the flowering plants: dicotyledons of the class Angiospermae (subclasses Magnoliidae, Ranunculidae, Caryophyllidae, Dilleniidae, Rosidae, Asteridae, and Lamiidae). Botanical Revue 66(4): 44l–647. * 2002. Thorne, R. F. How many species of seed plants are there? Taxon 51: 511–512. * 2006. Thorne, R. F. A bibliography of floristics in southern California: addendum number 2A. Crossosoma 31(2), Fall–Winter 2005 (issued 2006). * * 2007. Thorne, R. F. et al. Transmontane coniferous vegetation, pp. 575–586. In M. G. Barbour. T. Keeler.-Wolf and A. A. Schoenherr ds. Terrestrial Vegetation of California, 3rd ed., University of California Press, Berkeley, CA. * 2010. Thorne, R. F, R. V. Moran and R. A. Minnich. 2010. Vascular plants of the high Sierra San Pedro Mártir, Baja California, Mexico: an annotated checklist. Aliso (28): 1–57.

References

Bibliography

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Thorne, Robert Folger American taxonomists 1920 births 2015 deaths Botanists active in California Botanists active in North America Claremont Graduate University faculty Botanical Society of America Cornell University alumni Dartmouth College alumni Scientists from California 20th-century American botanists 21st-century American botanists American military personnel of World War II