Archives and Manuscript Collections
Records of the Herbarium (RG4)
ARTHUR CRONQUIST RECORDS (1939-1992)
25.4 linear feet (32 boxes)
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
Arthur
Cronquist (1919-1992), an internationally renowned systematic botanist,
was born on March 19, 1919, in San Jose, California. His boyhood was spent
in Portland, Oregon and in Pocatello, Idaho, where he became interested
in the natural history of the mountain regions of the west. Cronquist entered
the University of Idaho (now Idaho State University) where Professor Ray
J. Davis became an influential mentor. He gained a B.S. (1938) and M.S.
(1940) from Utah State University. Here he met Dr. Bassett Maguire, who
directed his course of study on the Aster foliaceus complex and
who later became a colleague at The New York Botanical Garden. Cronquist
gained his Ph.D. (1944) at the University of Minnesota under Dr. C. O.
Rosenthal and came to the Garden in 1943. He left for a short period to
teach botany at the University of Georgia (1946-1948) and at Washington
State University (1948-1951), then returned to the Garden in 1952.
At the Garden, Henry A. Gleason nurtured Cronquist's interest in floristics,
which led to a collaboration between the two men that resulted in publications
that remain botanical classics to this day. The first was Gleason's New
Britton and Brown Illustrated Flora (1952), to which Cronquist contributed
the section on the Asteraceae; the second was their Manual of
Vascular Plants of Northeastern United States and Adjacent Canada (1963),
known to botany students as "the Green Bible." The manual is an encyclopedic
reference and field book, whose intellectual genealogy can be traced to
Nathaniel Lord Britton and Addison Brown's original Illustrated Flora
of 1896-1898. A third co-authorship with Henry Gleason was The Natural
Geography of Plants (1964).
Through his career Cronquist conducted fieldwork throughout North America,
with a concentration on the study and collection of plants of the intermountain
regions of the western United States. These studies resulted in the publication
of Intermountain Flora (1972, volume one), co-authored with Arthur
H. Holmgren, Noel H. Holmgren, and James L. Reveal. Cronquist was an authority
on the family Compositae and authored three textbooks on introductory
botany. In the later 1950's he began a correspondence and collaboration
with the Armenian botanist, Armen Takhtajan, of the Komarov Institute in
Leningrad, U.S.S.R. His work with Takhtajan and associate biologists at
the Komarov proved a critical stimulus in the development of his synthetic
projects in general botanic systems. During his association and friendship
with Takhtajan, Cronquist studied and became proficient in Russian, visited
the (then) Soviet Union on several occasions, and promoted scientific exchanges
between the two countries.
As Director of Botany (1971-74) and Senior Scientist (1974-92), Cronquist
carried important administrative duties at the Garden and at its satellite
facility, the Cary Arboretum. During this time he also held faculty appointments
at Columbia University and the City University of New York, where he served
on the Executive Committee on Biology. His many professional affiliations
included the American Society of Plant Taxonomists (president, 1962), the
Botanical Society of America (president, 1973), the International Association
of Plant Taxonomy (council member), and the Torrey Botanical Club (president,
1976). Professional awards and honors included the Leidy Medal of the Academy
of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia (1970), honorary vice-president of the
XII International Botanical Congress, Leningrad (1975), the Asa Gray Award
(American Society of Plant Taxonomists, 1985), and the Medal for Botany,
Linnean Society of London (1986).
Arthur Cronquist was known for his towering physical stature, tall tales,
and congeniality as well as for his commanding position as a botanist and
educator. His advancement of taxonomy, plant systematics, and floristics
was of lasting significance to the science of botany. He died on March
22, 1992 while, studying plant specimens in the herbarium of Brigham Young
University in Utah.
SCOPE AND CONTENT
The Arthur Cronquist collection consists of correspondence, manuscripts
and typescripts, research papers, institutional and legal records, photographs,
and artwork spanning Dr. Cronquist's forty-year career at The New York
Botanical Garden (1952-1992). Artwork has been removed to The New York
Botanical Garden Art and Illustration Collection #15, and field notebooks
are located in the Collectors' Field Notebook collection. Records pertaining
to the American Society of Plant Taxonomists (ASPT) have been removed to
the Garden's repository collection.
SERIES DESCRIPTIONS
Series 1: Correspondence
(a): General Correspondence
(b): New York Botanical Garden Correspondence
(c): Russian Correspondence
Series 2: New York Botanical Garden Administration
Series 3: Scientific Affiliations
Series 4: Research Grants
Series 5: Education
Series 6: Manuscripts and Typescripts
Series 7: Publishing Companies
Series 8: Photography and Illustration
Series 9: Research Papers and Projects
Series 10: Cannabis Cases
Series 1 Correspondence, 1950-1992
6.3 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
The correspondence is indexed by correspondent's last name (or organization
name) and organized into three sub-series as follows. Correspondence is
also located in other series where appropriate.
Subseries 1a General Correspondence
Here are included letters from professional associates, occasional writers,
friends, and graduate students. The collection also includes carbon
copies of outgoing correspondence. Significant correspondents include Rolf
Dahlgren, Leo C. Hitchcock, Arthur H. Holmgren, Ernst Mayr, James Reveal,
Ernest Small, Frans Stafleu, and William C. Steere.
Subseries 1b New York Botanical Garden Correspondence
This collection includes outgoing and incoming correspondence and memoranda
of Garden staff relating to scientific and administrative work. Of special
interest are communications with Bassett Maguire and the correspondence
of Julius Cohn regarding a letter of Dr. Henry Gleason, dated November
15, 1952, in which Gleason details the history of his work as an ecologist.
This letter was published as "A Letter from Dr. Gleason" in Brittonia,
39(2), 1987, pp.205-209, with a short preface by Cronquist. The original
copy of Gleason's six-page letter to Cohn is attached to the Cohn-Cronquist
correspondence.
Subseries 1c Russian Correspondence
Here can be found outgoing and incoming correspondence with colleagues
in the former Soviet Union, some of which is typewritten in Russian (Cyrillic).
There are 7 files of Cronquist's correspondence with Armen Takhtajan (1957
to 1992), including 4 pertaining to specific projects or publications undertaken
in collaboration. One file pertains to the Soviet physicist and dissident
Andrei Sakharov relating to constituent opinions of the Botanical Society
of America members regarding a position statement of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science on the Sakharov case in 1973.
Series 2 New York Botanical Garden Administration,
1964-1992
1.6 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
This series includes records pertaining to Cronquist's administrative
duties, e.g., employment (applications, resumes, curriculum vitae), accounting
(budget and salary records), publications (meeting minutes), policy, general
affairs, and administration of the Cary Arboretum.
Series 3 Scientific Affiliations, 1953-1992
2.1 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
Series 3 consists of meeting minutes, correspondence, and notices relating
to the administration and publications in the several organizations represented.
Affiliations include the American Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS), the American Institute for Biological Sciences (IABS), the Botanical
Society of America (BSA), Flora North America (FNA), the Torrey Botanical
Club (TBC), and three International Botanical Congresses. As council member
of the American Society of Plant Taxonomists (ASPT), Cronquist received
documents relating to the founding of the organization in 1936 and correspondence
of the first 25 years of the society's existence. These files, all prior
to Cronquist's ASPT stewardship, have been removed from the collection
and placed with the records of the American Society of Plant Taxonomists
(Repository Archives, New York Botanical Garden).
Series 4 Research Grants, 1955-1992
1.0 lin. ft. Arranged by subject.
This collection comprises grant proposals and related materials relate
primarily to National Science Foundation (NSF) grants. The material consists
of reports, correspondence, and notes relating to grant proposals by Dr.
Cronquist for his own research and/or on behalf of others. In some cases,
proposals have several authors to fund joint projects. Notable proposals
include the Flora of the Pacific Northwest (Cronquist and Hitchcock)
and Intermountain Flora (Cronquist, et al).
Series 5 Education, 1967-1978
1.0 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
This series consists of administrative records relating to faculty and
administrative appointments Cronquist held at Columbia University and at
the City University of New York (CUNY). The records largely pertain to
doctoral review committees and the CUNY Executive Committee on Biology
and contain information relating to New York Botanical Garden affiliations
with the 2 universities.
Series 6 Manuscripts and Typescripts, 1939-1992
2.0 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically by author.
This series contains scientific articles in draft form (some in press),
many of which were directed to Cronquist for his review and advice. All
manuscripts and typescripts are indexed alphabetically by author. There
are 8 manuscripts authored by Cronquist himself, and 2 with T. Barkley
as co-author. Photographs and/or illustrations supporting the texts are
located in Series 8: Photography and Illustration.
Series 7 Publishing Companies, 1957-1992
0.3 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
Correspondence, contracts, sample pages, tear sheets, and lists of author's
corrections form the bulk of material in this series. While publishers
of scientific periodicals also appear here, most files pertain to publishing
houses that handle book-length works, especially university presses. Notable
here is Columbia University Press, publisher of Evolution and Classification
of Flowering Plants.
Series 8 Photography and Illustration, 1962-1991
3.75 lin. ft. Arranged by subject.
This series consists of loose and mounted photos, two-tone prints, mock-ups,
sketches, and other illustrations relating to book publications, especially
to the textbooks Introductory Botany, Basic Botany, and An Integrated
System of Classification of Flowering Plants. Illustrators of the latter
are Bobbi Angell and Robin Jess, whose work has been removed to The New
York Botanical Garden Art and Illustration Collection #15. There are also
several photo portraits of botanists, including Russian and Armenian scholars
from the Soviet Union.
Series 9 Research Papers and Projects, 1936-1990
6.2 lin. ft. Arranged alphabetically.
12 boxes of index cards of plant specimens collected in the field, organized
alphabetically by genus, make up a large part of this series. Each card
provides data on specimens collected in the field and include species name,
location and state, collection date, and collector's name. Additional information
on specimens appears in Dr. Cronquist's field notebooks located in The
New York Botanical Garden Collectors' Field Notebook Collection. There
are also notes and records of legal cases for which Cronquist was consulted,
notably the Cache Creek-Bear Thrust Environmental Impact Statement relating
to a legal battle to prevent land development near Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
Another involved information on a "creationism" case. The series also contains
5 files relating to Dr. Cronquist's death in 1992 and an unfinished research
project. Included are commemorative presentations delivered at the Arthur
Cronquist Memorial at The New York Botanical Garden on May 2, 1992.
Series 10 Cannabis Cases, 1972-1983
1.1 lin. ft. Arranged by subject.
This series consists of legal documents (testimonies, opinions, orders,
and summaries) of several criminal cases involving the prosecution of individuals
for possession of marijuana. Called upon for his taxonomic expertise, Cronquist
supplied information on the analysis and history of Cannabis taxonomy;
he held that the genus consists of only one species, Cannabis sativa.
There is also correspondence with Ernest Small, a Canadian colleague and
expert on Cannabis taxonomy, and its legal dimensions in American
society.
RELATED COLLECTIONS
The New York Botanical Garden
ART Collection #15
CFN Numbers 503-611
RG4 Records of the Herbarium Office (1933-1964)
RA American Society of Plant Taxonomists
Records
Processed June 1999 by David Rose under a grant from the
National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) PA-23141-98 and a grant from
the Harriet Ford Dickenson Foundation.
For more information and a complete description contact:
Susan Fraser, NYBG
Archivist
The LuEsther T. Mertz Library
The New York Botanical Garden
Bronx, NY 10458-5126
(718) 817-8879
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