CHARLES PICKERING 



1 80s- 1 878 

 Pickeringia Montana ' — NUTTALL 



Charles Pickering, known to the scientific 

 world as an anthropologist and botanist, was of 

 good New England stock, being a grandson of 

 Col. Timothy Pickering, a member of Washing- 

 ton's military family and of his first cabinet. He 

 was born on Starucca Creek, Upper Susque- 

 hanna, Pennsylvania, on a grant of land owned 

 by his grandfather. His father, Timothy Pick- 

 ering, died when thirty, leaving Charles and his 

 brother Edward to the care of their mother. 



He left Harvard before graduation, but took 

 his M. D. there in 1826. In his earlier years he 

 used to make botanical expeditions with one 

 William Oakes ; and when he settled in Philadel- 



^ Nuttall named two genera for Pickering. The first Pickeringia 

 (P. paniculata) , of the family Myrsinaceae, turned out to be a species 

 of Ardisia. He therefore called another new genus (of leguminous 

 plants) Pickeringia (type, P. montana), and this name is still in use 

 among certain botanists. However, I doubt if you will find the name 

 adopted in any recent American publication; for the view now pre- 

 vails that a name can be used only for the genus for which it was first 

 proposed, and if it cannot be used for that (as Pickeringia cannot, 

 because Ardisia is an older name) it cannot be used for any. The 

 second Pickeringia is now Xylotkamnia. (J. H. Barnhart.) 



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