MEMOIR OF CHARLES WACHSMUTH. 375 



The story of his life is easily told. Charles Wacbsmuth was born on 

 the 13th day of September, 1829. He was a native of Hanover, Ger- 

 many, from which place he came to America as the agent of a German 

 emigration company in 1852. He spent two years in New York city, 

 and then, in the hope of finding a climate more suitable to the condition 

 of his health, he removed to Burlington, Iowa. At Burlington he entered 

 into business on his own account; here, too, he was married. His union 

 in 1855 to Miss Bernandina Lorenz was one of those felicitous events that 

 profoundly affected his life and insured the success of the work to which 

 his future years were to be devoted. Domestic peace, loving and ever 

 vigilant care for his health and comfort, companionship in his rambles 

 and more extended journeys in quest of specimens, enthusiastic encour- 

 agement and energetic helpfulness in all his work, whether in field or 

 study, these were the blessings that this devoted wife brought to her hus- 

 band. The world of science owes a large debt to Mrs. Wachsmuth. 



The Wachsmuth collection of crinoids was first brought prominently 

 to the attention of paleontologists by the publication of volumes II, III, 

 and V of the " Geology of Illinois." A very large proportion of the spe- 

 cies of crinoids described by Meek and Worthen in the volumes men- 

 tioned had been collected, freed from the matrix, critically studied, and 

 their taxonomic relations determined by the zealous but unobtrusive 

 paleontologist of Burlington. 



In 1865 Mr Wachsmuth closed out his business and thenceforth de- 

 voted his entire energies to work on crinoids. The large size and rare 

 beauty of his collection attracted the notice of Professor Agassiz in 1873. 

 Soon the collection was bought outright, and Wachsmuth was engaged 

 to go with it as curator of crinoids in the Museum of Comparative Zoology 

 at Cambridge. His connection with the museum, which terminated with 

 the death of his revered friend, gave him enlarged opportunities for study 

 in his favorite field, so that when he returned to Burlington, after an 

 extensive tour of Europe and the Orient, Wachsmuth took up the study 

 of crinoids with even greater ardor than before. About this time Mr 

 Wachsmuth found in Mr Frank Springer, then a young attorney of Bur- 

 lington, a collector of crinoids quite as enthusiastic as himself. Com- 

 mon interests and common tastes brought these men together, and 

 acquintance soon developed into friendship. Since then, until the death 

 of the senior put an end to the happy association, the energies of both 

 were devoted to a single end, and the collections grew and embraced the 

 crinoids of every region and of all geologic time. The literature of the 

 subject also was collected until every important publication relating to 

 the special subject of study found a place on the shelves of their work- 

 ing library. It was with the preparation and equipment above indicated 



LVI— Bull. Geol. Soc. Am., Vol. 8, 1896 



