Education
Ames entered Harvard College in 1894, receiving his A.B. in 1898 and his A.M. in 1899.
Oakes at his microscope, 1941
Economic Botany Library of Oakes Ames
Biographies & Memoirs Botany Orchids Economic Botany Oakes Ames Harvard University.(1980) Collected and edited by Pauline Ames Plimpton, his daughter, and with a Foreword by George Plimpton, his grandson
Ames entered Harvard College in 1894, receiving his A.B. in 1898 and his A.M. in 1899.
Ames's study of orchids began while he was still a very young man. Ames's childhood interest in botany was shared by his father, who had several greenhouses set up at the family home in North Easton. Ames states in his journal. But soon a private collection was not enough. Ames, determined to take every botanical course he could find, went to Harvard.
His wife Blanche Ames, an accomplished artist, went along with him on many of his trips. She illustrated all of his technical papers and made extremely beautiful and accurate drawings and etchings of hundreds of new species.
Ames also gathered together an amazingly complete collection of orchid literature from all over the world. The collection includes more than 5,000 volumes of books and journals devoted exclusively to the identification and classification of orchid species worldwide. In 1938 he donated his orchid library to Harvard. Included in this were many of his manuscripts, letters, and Blanche's original drawings. These are located in the Oakes Ames Orchid Herbarium Archives.
Oaks Ames's accomplishments were not limited to scholarship and collecting, however. As Director of the Botanical Museum, he initiated "a program of research and publication" as well as seeking (and finding) the financial support neccesary for the creation of an endowment fund. The Botanical Museum Leaflets of Harvard University began publication during his tenure with the museum, and did not cease publication until over 50 years later, in 1986.
During his botanical career, Ames identified and studied orchids from Florida, the Caribbean, the Philippines, and Central & South America. He described more than 1,100 new species and 9 new genera and was considered the leading authority on the Orchidaceae of the Philippines.
Ames also had an interest in economic botany. This became his other major field of study after he taught a course "Outlines of Economic Botany" in 1909-1910, and a few years later gave several lectures on medical botany at the Harvard School of Tropical Medicine. His devotion to economic botany led Ames to collect what might be the most complete library and herbarium on the subject, both of which are now part of the Harvard University Herbaria.
