(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 1: Cyclopaedia of collectors)

(Source: Flora Malesiana ser. 1, 5: Cyclopaedia of collectors, Supplement I)

Born: 1888, Marshall, Minnes., U.S.A. Died: 1938, Berkeley, California

career:

From August 1915-April 1920 Mycologist of the Bureau of Science, Manila, P.I.;¹ from 1923-27 Phytopathologist of the U.S. Rubber Company in Asahan (Sumatra East Coast); since 1929 (according to Chronica Botanica since 1932) on the staff of the Calif. Forest Experiment Station at Berkeley.

Several plants were named after him by Merrill (cf. Backer, Verkl. Woordenb., 1936).

Collecting localities:

Between 1915-20 in various localities in the Philippines.-1916. Luzon: Mountain Province and in southern Tayabas. -1917. Luzon: Rizal Prov.; visit to Java (Buitenzorg, Tjibodas (May 13-16) and Singapore;² extensive trip to Mindanao, Basilan and Br. N. Borneo (Oct. 17 at Sapeng).³- Oct. 1918-Apr. 1919. On leave in America.-In or before 1921 he evidently collected in Sumatra East Coast, and seemingly in Sarawak too.-Sumatra East Coast: G. Sibajak (early May 1922).^8-1923-c. 1928. Mainly in Sumatra, from May 28, 1923 onwards. Sumatra East Coast, and a little in Tap(i)anoeli (W. Sumatra):⁴ principally in the Karo Lands, Asahan, Batoe Bara, Simeloengoen, and Deli; also on the Tapanoeli side of Toba Lake (Dec. 26, 1926; Apr. 2-3, 1927); in Sumatra West Coast: Fort de Kock (Apr. 22, 1927) In 1927/28 he made a 2nd trip to Java, visiting Buitenzorg and Tjibodas once more,⁵ collecting on G Gedeh-Pangrango and at Kandangbadak (March 1928), in W. Java. A few months after he left his position with the U.S. Rubber Co., he still made collections, for the greater part in Sumatra West Coast.

collections:

Herb. Manila [PNH]: Philippine plants (many Fungi) numbered in the B.S. series and a few in the F.B. (cf. respectively sub Bureau of Science and Forestry Bureau, Manila) series; 117 Borneo plants (1917);³ 110 specim. of Sumatra plants for identification (1921); 569 Sumatra plants (by exch. 1930). In U.S. Nat. Herb. Wash. [US]: 800 Sumatra, 44 P.I., and 62 Java dupl.

His Sumatra collections 1923-28⁶ comprised l l sets; the 1st set, fully labelled with field notes, in Herb. Berkeley [UC] (Cal.); the others distributed by Merrill, to the U.S. Nat. Herb. Washington [US] (c. 300), Herb. Kew [K] (pres. 1925), etc. Yates retained personally the partial 11^th set of the Sumatra col­lection 1923-Apr. 1927, which he presented to the University of Michigan [MICH].⁷ This partial set was likewise accompanied by full field notes, and was used by Bartlett to draw up the schedule of collecting localities with numbers. Several Sumatra duplicates in Herb. Bog. [BO], Herb. Leiden [L]; Herb. N. Y. Bot. Gard [NY]: 1223 specim. from Sumatra (acq. 1931); Herb. Deless. (Geneva [G]): 116 Sumatra plants; Herb. Copenhagen [C]; 429 Java plants 1927 in Herb. Berkeley[UC] (Cal.) (nos 2667-3095); some Java dupl. in Herb. Arn. Arbor. [A].

His Sumatra collections from 1923-Apr. 1927 are numbered from 520-2357, the highest number from Sumatra being 2665. We came across the nos 21, 36 and 81 from Br. N. Borneo, and a no 379 from Sarawak. In 1917 he possibly started numbering his plants from the Malay Archipelago from 1 upwards.

literature:

(1) Author of papers on Philippine Fungi (in Philip. Journ. Sci. C. Bot. 1917-18), on the growth of Hevea brasiliensis in the Philippines (in l.c. 1919), etc.

(2) cf. Philip. Journ. Sci. C. Bot. 12, 1917, p.305.

(3) cf. Philip. Journ. Sci. 21, 1922, p. 528-529. Fungi by H.S. Yates in l.c. C. Bot. 13, 1918, p. 233-240.

(4) cf. extensive list of localities with dates and numbers by Bartlett in Nat. & Appl. Sci. Bull. Philip. 4, 1925, p. 221-227.

(5) cf. Versl. Pl. Tuin Buitenzorg for 1927, p. 2 and 4.

(6) cf. H.H. Bartlett, The Batak Lands of North Sumatra, from the standpoint of recent American botanical collections (in Nat. & Appl. Sci. Bull. Philip. 4, 1925), p. 220-221.

(7) Together with the collection of Bartlett, Hamel, and Rahmat si Boeea, they provided material for several papers, e.g.:

E.B. Copeland: ‘New pteridophytes of Sumatra’ (Univers. Calif. Publ. Bot. 14, 1929, p. 371-378, pl. 55-61).

H.N. Dixon: ‘Contributions to the moss flora of Sumatra’ (Ann. Bryol. 5, 1932, p. 17-50).

A.W. Evans: ‘Some representative species of Bazzania from Sumatra’ (Pap. Michig. Acad. 17, 1933, p. 69-118, pl. XIII-XVIII).

E.D. Merrill: ‘New Sumatran plants’ I-VI (Pap. Michig. Acad. Sci. Arts & Lett. 19, 1934, p. 149-203, pl. XVI-XXXV; l.c. 20, 1935, p. 95-112; l.c. 23, 1937, p. 177-202; l.c. 24, 1938, p. 63-92).

(8) A.W. Yates: ‘Two botanists on Sibajak Volcano’ (Madroño 1, 1923, p. 96-97).

biographical data:

Madrono 4, 1938, p. 187-188.

photo gallery: