Chrono-Biographical Sketch: Irving Bailey

Some Biogeographers, Evolutionists and Ecologists:
Chrono-Biographical Sketches

Bailey, Irving Widmer (United States 1884-1967)
botany, forestry

Photo courtesy of the Torrey Botanical Society.

Bailey is another of those individuals whose research emphases can be described in various ways; thus, beyond the "botanist" and "forester" tags he was more specifically interested in angiosperm evolution, tree anatomy and cytology, microscopy, forest ecology, wood technology, and forensics. During most of his life his studies emphasized angiosperms; he became best known for his work on the magnolia and cacti groups. Bailey traveled widely, gaining a reputation as an authority on all these subjects despite the fact that he never published an original book, only rarely attended scientific meetings, and did little teaching.

Life Chronology

--born in Tilton, New Hampshire, on 15 August 1884.
--1889-1899: lives childhood years near Arequipa, Peru, at high altitude astronomical laboratory
--1907: A.B., Harvard University
--1909: M.F. (forestry), Harvard University
--1909-1910: instructor in forestry, Harvard
--1912-1920: assistant professor of forestry, Harvard University
--1914-1916: member, advisory board of the U.S. Forest Products Laboratory
--1917-1918: serves as a wood technologist at Wright Field, Dayton
--1917-1922: member, National Research Council
--1918: publishes "Size Variation in Tracheary Cells" in the Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
--1920: studies tree cavity-inhabiting ants in British Guiana
--1920-1927: associate professor of forestry, Harvard University
--1924-1926: council member, Union of American Biological Societies
--1927: made professor of plant anatomy at the Bussey Institution, Harvard
--1929: elected to the National Academy of Sciences
--1931: honorary D.Sc., University of Wisconsin
--1944: publishes "The Development of Vessels in Angiosperms and Its Significance in Morphological Research" in the American Journal of Botany
--1945: president, Botanical Society of America
--1945: authors the Bailey Report (regarding reorganizing Harvard's botanical program)
--1946: made chairman, Institute for Research in General Plant Morphology
--1947-1949: vice-president, American Academy of Arts and Sciences
--1954: receives Mary Soper Pope Award from the Cranbrook Institute of Science
--1955: honorary D.Sc., Harvard University
--1956: receives the Award of Merit from the Botanical Society of America
--dies at Cambridge, Massachusetts, on 16 May 1967.

For Additional Information, See:

--American National Biography, Vol. 1 (1999).
--Biographical Memoirs, National Academy of Sciences (U.S.A.), Vol. 45 (1974).
--Journal of the Arnold Arboretum, Vol. 49 (1968): 1-13.
--Phytomorphology, Vol. 18(2) (1968): 294-298.
--Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club, Vol. 95(3) (1968): 299-305.

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