Abstract
THE death on June 19 of Dr. Nathaniel Lord Britton, for many years director-in-chief of the New York Botanical Garden, removes one of the most prominent figures in North American botany. Born on January 15, 1859, Britton took the degree of E.M. at Columbia University in 1879, proceeding to Ph.D. in 1881. It will come as a surprise to many who knew his work that the first nine years of his professional career (1879-87) were spent as assistant in geology at Columbia University, and that fourteen of his early papers published during the period 1882-89 dealt with geological subjects. His heart even then, however, was in botany, as is shown by the list of twenty-nine botanical papers covering the period 1878-87. From 1880 until 1890, Britton was botanist and assistant geologist to the New Jersey Geological Survey. His appointment as instructor in botany at Columbia University in 1887, followed by promotion to adjunct professor in 1890 and professor (1891-96), coincided with a great increase in his botanical output.
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SPRAGUE, T. Dr. N. L. Britton. Nature 134, 131 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/134131a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/134131a0