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American Entomology: A Description of the Insects of North American, with Illustrations Drawn and Colored After Nature; V. 2
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This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)
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This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Descriptions of Some New Terrestrial and Fluviatile Shells of North America, 1829, 1830, 1831
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This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.
This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
Thomas Say was an American entomologist, conchologist, and herpetologist. He also served as librarian for the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.
Background
Thomas was born on June 27, 1787 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, of Quaker ancestry.
His father, Dr. Benjamin Say, a member of the Society of Friends, was a physician and apothecary, served as a state senator and for two terms as a member of Congress, and at the time of his death was said to be one of the richest men in Philadelphia. His mother was Ann (Bonsall), daughter of Benjamin Bonsall of Kingsessing and granddaughter of John Bartram. As a boy Say had been interested in natural history through his mother's uncle, William Bartram.
Education
Young Say was educated at the Friends' school at Westtown, a short distance from Philadelphia, but this education was not broad and throughout life he is said to have felt the need of wider training. He then studied pharmacy with his father.
Career
After studies Thomas started a pharmacy shop with a partner, but the business failed because he too trustfully endorsed the notes of a friend. He served briefly with the volunteers in 1814 and was a member of the First City Troop for several years thereafter.
His great work, American Entomology, was planned and begun in 1816, and a ten-page prospectus was issued the following year. In 1818 he visited Georgia and Florida with several other members of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences - George Ord, William Maclure, and Titian R. Peale - and in 1819 he was appointed as zoologist to accompany the expedition to the Rocky Mountains under Maj. Stephen H. Long, by which large collections were made. He accompanied in the same capacity Long's second expedition, in 1823, which explored the sources of the Minnesota River.
During the next few years he was busily engaged in and out of Philadelphia, where he was made curator of the American Philosophical Society in 1821 and professor of natural history in the University of Pennsylvania in 1822. He held the former post until 1827 and the latter until 1828, although much of the time during these years he was away from the city.
In 1824 and 1825, respectively, appeared the first two volumes of his American Entomology; or Descriptions of the Insects of North America, and he prepared for the press the first volume (1825) of Charles Bonaparte's American Ornithology; or the Natural History of Birds Inhabiting the United States.
In 1825, in company with William Maclure, Charles Alexandre Lesueur, Robert Owen, and others, Say (at the age of thirty-eight) went to Indiana, where Owen had bought the village of New Harmony, intending to found there an ideal community. Like other experiments of the kind, this one soon failed; the founders were involved in lawsuits, which finally were compromised, and Owen returned to Europe.
During late 1827 and early 1828 he went to New Orleans and Mexico with Maclure, who was failing in health, and visited Vera Cruz, Jalapa, Mexico City, Tacuba, and Chalco. Nevertheless, he worked on industriously and completed the third volume (1828) of his American Entomology as well as the six numbers of his American Conchology which were published (1830 - 34) at New Harmony.
His published letters and it is believed that he wrote at least a part of the narrative of Long's expeditions. His collections and library went to the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences after his death, and through neglect, the greater part of his collections was allowed to go to ruin.
Say died, apparently from typhoid fever, in New Harmony on 10 October 1834, when he was 47 years old.
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Membership
Say was one of the original members of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences (founded in 1812).
Personality
In person, Say was six feet tall, and slender; he spoke with a slight lisp. His health had been poor even before he left Philadelphia, owing probably in part to his very frugal diet. He was very often ill, after his return from Mexico, probably with malaria and surely with obstinate stomach trouble.
Quotes from others about the person
Dr. John Lawrence LeConte, in the Preface to his edition of Say's entomological papers, said: "His descriptions are so clear as to leave scarcely a doubt as to the objects designated. "
Connections
In January 4, 1827, Say had married Lucy Way Sistaire, and he maintained his home in New Harmony for the rest of his life.