SAMT^EL WFADEI.L WILLISTOX. 421 



SAMUEL WENDELL WILLISTOX (1S52-191S) 



Fellow in Class II, Sanllon 1, l'.)15 



In the death of Doctor Wilhston, North America has lost one of 

 its oldest and ablest workers in \Vrtel)rate Paleontology. He had 

 specialized in this branch of science since 1874, his especial field being 

 extinct reptiles and amphibians. For the last decade and a half he 

 was head of the Department of \'ertebrate Paleontology in Chicago 

 University. 



Samuel Wendell ^^'illiston was born in Boston (Roxbury), Massa- 

 chusetts, July 10, 1852; he died at Chicago, Illinois, August 30, 1918. 

 His 66 years of life were strenuous ones, for with many handicaps 

 and against many obstacles he won place for himself as one of the 

 world's greatest authorities on Vertebrate Paleontology. His father, 

 who traced his ancestry in Massachusetts back to 1650, could neither 

 read nor WTite; he did not like study. His mother had a common 

 school education. In the spring of 1857 the family emigrated to 

 Manhattan, Kansas, at a time when the last 115 miles had to be made 

 by ox-team. After attending the common schools of the town, he 

 entered the State x\gricultural College in 1866. Here his teacher of 

 science. Professor B. F. Mudge, had great influence upon his future 

 life. Though Professor Mudge taught all science from natural philoso- 

 phy, tln-ough chemistry, geology, zoology, botany, veterinary science 

 to surveying, conic sectiorrs and calculus, he found considerable 

 time for research along geologic and paleontologic lines; and along 

 these lines young Williston naturally became interested. After 

 graduating from college in 1872 he followed C'ni\ Engineering for a 

 year, after which he studied medicine with his famil}- physician. In 

 1874 he accepted the invitation of a friend to go with him to north- 

 western Kansas where Professor ]\Iudge was collecting vertebrate 

 fossils for Professor Marsh of Yale University. The following year 

 he again joined the party and as a result of his successful work ISIarsh 

 invited him to come to New Haven. Here while aiding Marsh in his 

 paleontologic work he continued at intervals his study of medicine, 

 receiving the degree of ]M.I). from Yale I'ni^ersity in 1880 and Ph.D. 

 from the same institution in 1885. On December 20, 1880, Doctor 

 Williston married Miss Annie I. Hathaway of New Haven, Connecti- 

 cut. Throughout this time, since 1876, he continued collecting 



