American botanist who was the leading authority on North American plants in his day, and whose publication Darwiniana helped to reconcile Darwin's theory with American Protestantism.
Background
He was born Nov. 18, 1810, on a farm in Sauquoit, N.Y., and his father had sufficient respect for education to see that his son attended schools and academies in the neighborhood, and finally a country medical school at Fairfield, N.Y. It was there that Gray became interested in science, especially botany. Although he practiced medicine briefly, his botanical interests and correspondence soon crowded out all else.
Gray lived in Cambridge, Mass., for the rest of his life, carrying the whole burden of botanical instruction at Harvard until 1873, and continuing as director of the herbarium, which he gave to the university, until his death. He solidified his many European friendships by journeys there in 1850, 1855, 1868, 1880, and 1887. After 1872, he traveled extensively in the western United States.
Career
Under the pretense of purchasing books for this new institution, Gray spent the year 1838-1839 in Europe, being warmly received by Europe's botanists. By studying type specimens of American plants in British and Continental herbaria, he made possible, for the first time, the systematic study of American flora by scientists in American institutions. On his return to New York, Gray worked with Torrey on Flora of North America until 1842, when Harvard appointed him Fisher Professor of Natural History.
His greatest significance lay, however, in his friendship with Charles Darwin. Gray began corresponding with Darwin regularly during the years in which the Origin of Species was being formulated. Gray's accounting for the separate occurrence of peculiar species and genera of plants in eastern North America and in Japan had been fundamental work in the new science of plant geography. This work led him to accept the concept of transmutation of closely related species even before the publication of Darwin's Origin in 1859. He became one of the first fair and receptive commentators on the book in the transatlantic community, and represented Darwin in dealing with American publishers.
Religion
Gray had an orthodox religious position based on the belief in a design in nature, and to him, Darwin's theories did not mean the banishing of this design. For a while, Darwin considered following Gray's thoughts on design in answering theological objections to his theory, but ultimately rejected this alternative. Gray remained insistent that evolution and the belief in a design in nature were compatible, and after the publication of his Darwiniana in 1876, he was a major force in bringing American Protestantism to an accommodation with the new findings of science.