Background

Charles Sedgwick Minot was born on December 23, 1852, in Roxbury, Boston, Massachusetts, United States to the family of William Minot II and Catharine "Kate" Maria Sedgwick. A paternal ancestor was Jonathan Edwards; and on both sides, there were several distinguished lawyers and public figures. Growing up on his wealthy father’s country estate, he early became interested in natural history and at the age of seventeen published articles on insect and bird life.

Education

Minot graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1872 and then entered the graduate school of Harvard College, where he worked under Henry P. Bowditch spending a summer with Louis Agassiz at Penikese, Massachusetts. In 1873 he went to Leipzig to work with Karl Ludwig and Rudolf Leuckart. He was also in Paris for a few months with Louis-Antoine Ranvier and at Würzburg.

After his return to America in 1876, Minot completed in 1878 the requirements for his Harvard doctorate in science.

Career

After two years of private biological research, in 1880 Minot joined the Harvard faculty, at first in the dental school and, after 1883, in the department of histology and embryology of the school of medicine. There he began what became an outstanding collection of vertebrate embryos. To facilitate the work of sectioning them, he invented in 1886 the automatic rotary microtome, ever since in worldwide use. In 1892 Minot published his chief work, Human Embryology, a masterly summation of unwieldy literature and a highly original presentation of the major problems of that branch of science. Among his many research accomplishments were an account of the microscopic structure of the human placenta and a description of the blood channels in the liver since known by his term “sinusoids.”

Minot’s wide-ranging intellect led him into very broad fields of thought. For a few years, he was active in the American Society for Psychical Research, from which he withdrew when finally convinced of its unscientific outlook. Deep reflection about the nature of life, its origin, course, and termination guided his protracted studies of the growth of animals and the progressive changes in cell structure from birth to death.

Minot exerted a wide influence on American biology of his time in his books, numerous papers in scientific journals, and lectures, all presented with clarity and stylistic elegance. Reserved in a professional manner and sometimes sharply critical of other workers in matters of scientific judgment, he was a genial participant in the professional societies of natural history, anatomy, and physiology. He was one of a small group of biologists and medical scientists who broadened the study and teaching of anatomy in the United States to include not only gross morphology but also embryology, histology, and physical anthropology, and transformed the American Association of Anatomists from a small society with limited interests to its present breadth and strength.

Achievements

• Charles Sedgwick Minot was a prominent biologist and anatomist of his time. His eminence in human and comparative embryology was recognized by honorary degrees from Yale, Toronto, St. Andrews, and Oxford universities and by a visiting professorship at Berlin.

Works

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  • A laboratory text-book of embryology 1905
  • The Problem Of Age, Growth, And Death: A Study Of Cytomorphosis, Based On Lectures At The Lowell Institute, March, 1907 1907
  • Modern Problems of Biology; Lectures Delivered at the University of Jena, December, 1912 1912
  • Human Embryology 1892
  • Morphology of The Blood Corpuscles 1890
  • On the veins of the Wolffian bodies in the pig 1898
  • Studies On The Tongue Of Reptiles And Birds 1880
  • Normal Plates Of The Development Of The Rabbit, Lepus Cuniculus L. 1905
  • A Bibliography Of Vertebrate Embryology 1893
  • Histology of the Locust (Caloptenus) and of the Cricket (Anabrus) 1880
  • The Study Of Mammalian Embryology 1900
  • On The Solid Stage Of The Large Intestine In The Chick With A Note On The Ganglion Coli 1900
  • On Heredity and Rejuvenation 1896
  • Uterus and Embryo: I. Rabbit; II. Man 1889
  • Letters from Charles Sedgwick to His Family and Friends 1870
  • The Work of the Naturalist in the World 1894

Views

Minot was highly critical of Alfred Percy Sinnett's Esoteric Buddhism and the claims of Theosophy.

Membership

Minot was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1897 and served as president of the American Society of Naturalists, the American Association of Anatomists, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

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  National Academy of Sciences , United States

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  American Society of Naturalists , United States

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  American Association for the Advancement of Science , United States

Connections

Charles Sedgwick Minot was married, on June 1, 1889, to Lucy Fosdick of Groton, Massachusetts.

Father:

William Minot II

Mother:

Catharine Maria Sedgwick

Wife:

Lucy Fosdick

grand nephew :

George Minot

mentor:

Henry Bowditch

References

• Dictionary of Scientific Biography: Volumes 9 & 10
  1981
• Biographical Memoir of Charles Sedgwick Minot: 1852-1914
  1919
• Charles Sedgwick Minot
  1914