James Francis Macbride (19 May 1892 16 June 1976) was an American botanist who devoted most of his professional life to the study of the flora of Peru.

Early life and education

Born on 19 May 1892 in

Rock Valley, Iowa Rock Valley is a city in Sioux County, Iowa, the North Western corner of Iowa, United States, along the Rock River. The population was 4,059 at the time of the 2020 census. Geography Rock Valley is located at (43.201624, -96.296379). According ...

, Macbride graduated from the

University of Wyoming The University of Wyoming (UW) is a public land-grant research university in Laramie, Wyoming. It was founded in March 1886, four years before the territory was admitted as the 44th state, and opened in September 1887. The University of Wyomin ...

in 1914 and worked briefly at the

Gray Herbarium The Harvard University Herbaria and Botanical Museum are institutions located on the grounds of Harvard University at 22 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Botanical Museum is one of three which comprise the Harvard Museum of Natu ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

Career

In 1921, Macbride joined the staff of the Department of Botany at

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 ...

, Chicago, to head the nascent Flora of Peru program. Peru had been selected as the center of floristic research by C. F. Millspaugh, the Museum's first Curator of Botany. In 1922, Macbride and his assistant William Featherstone embarked on the first of two expeditions to Peru. They initially collected in the highland regions of the Departments of Lima, Junín, Huánuco, and Pasco. Macbride returned the following year to the

Huánuco region Huánuco (; qu, Wanuku) is a city in central Peru. It had a population of 196,627 as of 2017 and in 2015 it had a population of 175,068. It is the capital of the Huánuco Region and the Huánuco District. It is the seat of the diocese of Hu ...

and the Río Ucayali. For a decade from 1929, Macbride visited all the major herbaria of Europe to photograph

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of tropical American flora preserved in herbaria, accumulating photographs of over 40,000 specimens. These photographs were to prove of particular importance, as many of the specimens held in German herbaria were later destroyed in the Allied bombing campaigns of

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 World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. Expeditions to Peru continued in his absence, and by 1936 the Field Museum's herbarium held over 33,000 Peruvian plant specimens, the largest such collection in the world. in 1936, publication of the ''Flora of Peru'' began, and continued for another 24 years. In the late 1940s, Macbride moved to California, where he continued his work on the ''Flora'' at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Fran ...

and at Stanford University, publishing his last family treatment in 1960, leaving only 20 families out of 180 untreated in the series.

Personal life and death

Macbride died aged 84 on 16 June 1976 at

Riverside, California Riverside is a city in and the county seat of Riverside County, California, United States, in the Inland Empire metropolitan area. It is named for its location beside the Santa Ana River. It is the most populous city in the Inland Empire and ...

.Anon. (1976). James Francis Macbride, 1892–1976. ''Madroño'' 23:456. 1976.

Eponymy

Macbride is commemorated by the plant genus of ''

Macbrideina ''Macbrideina'' is a monotypic genus of flowering plants belonging to the family Rubiaceae. It only contains one known species, Macbrideina peruviana Standl. Its native range is western South America and is found in the countries of Bolivia, Col ...

'' Standley and numerous other species; such as ''Tephrosia macbrideana'' .

Works

Macbride, J. F. (1936-1960). ''Flora of Peru'', Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago. http://www.sacha.org/macbr/intro.htm

References