HENRY ROWE SCHOOLCRAFT. 



1793-1864. 



MR. SCHOOLCRAFT was a conspicuous figure in the scien- 

 tific life of the early part of the century. A pioneer in some 

 fields, the immediate follower of the pioneers in others, he 

 was, in all the branches of research to which he gave atten- 

 tion, earnest, ready, diligent, sagacious, original, and modest. 

 As among his titles to be remembered, the biographer who 

 prefaces his Personal Memoirs names the early period at which 

 he entered the field of observation in the United States as a 

 naturalist ; the enterprise he manifested in exploring the geog- 

 raphy and geology of the great West ; and his subsequent 

 researches as an ethnologist in investigating the Indian lan- 

 guages and history. " To him we are indebted for our first 

 accounts of the geological constitution and the mineral wealth 

 and resources of the great valley beyond the Alleghanies, and 

 he is the discoverer of the actual source of the Mississippi 

 River in Itasca Lake. For many years, beginning with 1817, 

 he stirred up a zeal for natural history from one end of the 

 land to the other, and, after his settlement in the West, he was 

 a point of approach for correspondents " on these topics and 

 for all the Indian tribes. 



Henry Rowe Schoolcraft was born in Albany County, 

 N. Y., March 28, 1793, and died in Washington, D. C., Decem- 

 ber 10, 1864. He was the descendant, in the third generation, 

 of an Englishman, James Calcraft, who, having served with 

 credit in the armies of the Duke of Marlborough, came to 

 America in the reign of George II, in the military service, and 

 was present at operations connected with the building of Forts 

 Anne, Edward, and William Henry. After these campaigns 

 he settled in Albany County as a land-surveyor, married, and 

 in his old age, conducted a large school the first English 

 school that was taught in that frontier region. In connec- 



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