2 WILLIAM KEITH BROOKS 



shown special interest in philosophy and in studies with the micro- 

 scope, he was uncertain on graduation whether to devote himself 

 to natural history, to mathematics or to Greek, in all of which 

 subjects he excelled. After leaving Williams College he spent 

 a short time with his father in business, but this occupation was 

 not to his liking and he gave it up to become a teacher in a school 

 for boys at Niagara Falls. After holding that position for two 

 years he became a graduate student at Harvard College under 

 Louis Agassiz, who was then at the zenith of his career, and at 

 the seaside laboratory established by this great master in 1873 on 

 the Island of Penikese, Brooks began a life-long devotion to the 

 study of marine zoology. In 1875 he was appointed assistant 

 in the museum of the Boston Society of Natural History and in 

 the same year received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy from 

 Harvard. It was during the summer of this year, while at home 

 on his vacation, that he organized, together with Theodore B. 

 Comstock and Albert H. Tut tie, a class for laboratory instruction 

 in zoology and botany for teachers. 



With the opening of the Johns Hopkins University in 1876, one 

 of the twenty fellowships was awarded Brooks, who thus at its 

 very foundation entered the service of the institution with which 

 he was to remain connected until his death. He was immediately 

 advanced to the position of Associate and later was successively 

 appointed Associate Professor of Comparative Anatomy, Asso- 

 ciate Professor of Morphology, Professor of Animal Morphology, 

 Professor of Zoology and Head of the Biological Department. 

 In 1878 he was made Director of the Chesapeake Zoological 

 Laboratory of the University, an institution which he organized 

 and which became a potent adjunct to the Baltimore laboratory 

 in the training of biologists. 



Professor Brooks was the recipient of numerous public honors. 

 When but thirty-six years of age he was elected a member of 

 the National Academy. He was chosen a member of the Ameri- 

 can Philosophical Society in 1886, and of the Academy of Natural 

 Sciences in 1887. He was Lowell lecturer in 1901 and gave one 

 of the three general addresses before the International Zoolog- 

 ical Congress at Boston, in 1907. He received the honorary de- 



