George Suckley (1830–1869) was an American

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

and naturalist notable as an explorer of the

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

and

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

territories in the 1850s, and describer of several new

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...

species.

Life

He was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, studied at the College of Physicians and Surgeons (today

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

), received an M.D. in 1851, and subsequently served as

surgeon In modern medicine, a surgeon is a medical professional who performs surgery. Although there are different traditions in different times and places, a modern surgeon usually is also a licensed physician or received the same medical training as ...

New York Hospital Weill Cornell Medical Center (previously known as New York Hospital or Old New York Hospital or City Hospital) is a research hospital in New York City. It is part of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and the teaching hospital for Cornell University. ...

. In April 1853 Suckley was appointed assistant surgeon and naturalist to the

Pacific Railroad Survey The Pacific Railroad Surveys (1853–1855) were of a series of explorations of the American West designed to find and document possible routes for a transcontinental railroad across North America. The expeditions included surveyors, scientists, and ...

led by

Isaac Stevens Isaac Ingalls Stevens (March 25, 1818 – September 1, 1862) was an American military officer and politician who served as governor of the Territory of Washington from 1853 to 1857, and later as its delegate to the United States House of Represen ...

. Initially commissioned as a surgeon with the U.S. Army, Suckley resigned in 1856 to pursue natural history full-time resulting in the publication of several works on the natural history of the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...

. Upon the outbreak of the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

, Suckley rejoined the Army and worked as a surgeon throughout the war. He died in New York City a few years after the war. Two fish species, ''

Squalus suckleyi The Pacific spiny dogfish (''Squalus suckleyi'') is a common species of the Squalidae (dogfish) family of sharks and are among the most abundant species of sharks in the world. This species is closely related to ''Squalus acanthias'' and for many ...

'' Girard 1855, and '' Catostomus sucklii'' Girard 1856, and the bumblebee '' Bombus suckleyi'' are named after George Suckley. In 1856, American botanist

A.Gray Asa Gray (November 18, 1810 – January 30, 1888) is considered the most important American botanist of the 19th century. His '' Darwiniana'' was considered an important explanation of how religion and science were not necessarily mutually exc ...

published ''

Suckleya ''Suckleya'' is a monotypic genus of flowering plant belonging to the family Amaranthaceae. It only contains one known species, Suckleya suckleyana (Torr.) Rydb. Its native range is western central Canada (within the province of Alberta) to weste ...

'', a genus of

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 ...

s from America belonging to the family

Amaranthaceae Amaranthaceae is a family of flowering plants commonly known as the amaranth family, in reference to its type genus ''Amaranthus''. It includes the former goosefoot family Chenopodiaceae and contains about 165 genera and 2,040 species, making it ...

, which were named in George Suckley's honor.

Works

* (with

James Graham Cooper James Graham Cooper (June 19, 1830 – July 19, 1902) was an American surgeon and naturalist. Cooper was born in New York. He worked for the California Geological Survey (1860–1874) with Josiah Dwight Whitney, William Henry Brewer and Henry N ...

) ''Natural History of Washington Territory'' (1859)

References

External links

*
Smithsonian page on Suckley

George Suckley Papers, 1849-1861
from the

Smithsonian Institution Archives Smithsonian Libraries and Archives is an institutional archives and library system comprising 21 branch libraries serving the various Smithsonian Institution museums and research centers. The Libraries and Archives serve Smithsonian Institution ...

1830 births 1869 deaths Union Army surgeons American ichthyologists {{AmericanCivilWar-bio-stub