iEORGE FERDINAND BECKER 



By George P. Merrill 



Dr. George F. Becker was born in New York City, January 5, 1847. His father was Alexander 

 Christian Becker, of a Danish family, settled in Archangel, Russia, where it is stated the head 

 of the house (Samuel Becker) held for a time the office of Danish consul, holding his commission 

 direct from the King of Denmark. Samuel Becker was a man of considerable wealth and given 

 to lavish entertaining, but lost his property through absorption in science, particularly the new 

 chemistry. On account of these financial troubles, Alexander Becker (the father of George F.) 

 came to the United States and settled in New York. His first venture was in mercantile life, 

 but finding this distasteful he studied medicine and entered upon the practice of his profession, 

 but died when the subject of this sketch was 2 years of age. 



" My mother's maiden name " writes Doctor Becker, "was Sarah Cary Tuckerman, a daughter 

 of the Rev. Joseph Tuckerman known in Boston as a philanthropist and the first Minister-at- 

 Large. He was a graduate of Harvard and an Overseer, and intimate friend of William Ellory 

 Channing, Joseph Story and other prominent men of the day. The only scientific Tuckerman 

 was my mother's first cousin, Edward, a member of this Academy [i. e., the National Academy 

 of Sciences]. 



" Cambridge was selected as a residence by my parents with a view to the education of their 

 two children Alexander Rudolph and myself. My mother's Cambridge friends were for the 

 most part in the University set. Benjamin A. Gould was a very constant visitor. C. C. Fulton 

 and Louis Agassiz married Mary Cary and Elizabeth Cary, first cousins of my mother. Charles 

 Henry Davis, the founder of the Nautical Almanach and later Rear Admiral, was a frequent and 

 welcome caller. Benjamin Peirce and Jeffries Wyman were likewise good neighbors. We knew 

 Asa Gray more slightly but saw little of the Bonds. Longfellow, Lowell, Richard H. Dana, 

 Holmes and Wolcott Gibbs and Charles Eliot Norton were valued acquaintances. 



" Most of the scientific men took some little interest in me a3 a child but I owe most to Agassiz, 

 Peirce and Wyman who seemed to like to encourage me in scientific curiosity. 



" I was flying my kite in a field one day about 1856, when Peirce joined me to ask if I knew why 

 it stayed up in the air. Of course I had no definite idea and he was at much pains to explain as 

 much as I could understand of a distinctly difficult subject; he then and there excited an interest 

 in my mind which has never yet wavered." 



There is abundant evidence in the correspondence to which the present writer has had access 

 that between mother and son there was early developed a strong bond of affection which was to 

 continue throughout their entire lives. 



It is told of George that when a boy of 4 years he quietly listened to his widowed mother all 

 the evening as she read the history of the " Commonwealth of Massachusetts." After he had 

 been tucked into bed, and sleep had come to him, his lonely mother was overcome with memories. 

 Going to the child's bed, she knelt down; the little fellow must have felt her presence, for he 

 reached out and touched her. "Oh, my child, who do you love?" said the mother. The 

 sleepy little childish voice answered: "Anyone who will do good to the Commonwealth of 

 Massachusetts." 



In early youth Doctor Becker showed a decided taste for natural history and was of a studious 

 and quiet nature, caring little for the talk and games of other boys. 



" Games and sports interested me but little, " he wrote, "and my mother had often to send 

 me to the Delta, now occupied by Memorial Hall, to play with the other boys. I could play 

 rounders and pre-Rugbian football decently well but I preferred gymnastics to these games 

 because I could do them alone. The boys' talk did not interest me and I had sense enough to 

 make no reference to natural history in their presence. 



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