Boston Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge

The Boston Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (est.1829) in Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

, was founded "to promote and direct popular education by lectures and other means." Modelled after the recently formed Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge

Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge

The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge , founded in 1826, and wound up in 1848, was a Whiggish London organisation that published inexpensive texts intended to adapt scientific and similarly high-minded material for the rapidly expanding reading public...

in London, the Boston group's officers included Daniel Webster

Daniel Webster

Daniel Webster was a leading American statesman and senator from Massachusetts during the period leading up to the Civil War. He first rose to regional prominence through his defense of New England shipping interests...

, Nathan Hale

Nathan Hale (journalist)

Nathan Hale was an American journalist and newspaper publisher who introduced regular editorial comment as a newspaper feature.-Life and career:...

, Jacob Bigelow

Jacob Bigelow

Jacob Bigelow was an American medical doctor, botanist, and architect of Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.-Biography:...

, William Ellery Channing

William Ellery Channing

Dr. William Ellery Channing was the foremost Unitarian preacher in the United States in the early nineteenth century and, along with Andrews Norton, one of Unitarianism's leading theologians. He was known for his articulate and impassioned sermons and public speeches, and as a prominent thinker...

, Edward Everett

Edward Everett

Edward Everett was an American politician and educator from Massachusetts. Everett, a Whig, served as U.S. Representative, and U.S. Senator, the 15th Governor of Massachusetts, Minister to Great Britain, and United States Secretary of State...

, Nathaniel L. Frothingham

Nathaniel Langdon Frothingham

Nathaniel Langdon Frothingham was an American Unitarian minister and pastor of the First Church of Boston from 1815 to 1850. Frothingham was opposed to Theodore Parker and the interjection of transcendentalism into the church...

, and Abbott Lawrence

Abbott Lawrence

Abbott Lawrence was a prominent American businessman, politician, and philanthropist...

. The society published the American Library of Useful Knowledge, a series of scholarly works by British and American authors. Public lectures on a variety of topics were held at Boston's Masonic Temple, and other venues.

History

In 1829 the founders explained their reasons for creating the society:

"From infancy to the age of seventeen, the means provided in this city by public munificence and private enterprise, are ample. From seventeen to the age when young men enter on the more active and responsible duties of their several stations, sufficient opportunity does not appear to be afforded for mental and moral cultivation. At this period of life, when the mind is active and the passions urgent, and when the invitations to profitless amusements are strongest and most numerous, it is desirable that means should be provided for furnishing at a cheap rate, and in an inviting form, such useful information as will not only add to the general intelligence of the young men referred to, but at the same time will prepare them to engage more understandingly, with a deeper interest, and with better prospect of success, in the pursuits to which their lives are to be devoted.

The existing deficiency of such means is clearly a subject of regret; and the undersigned are of opinion that this deficiency may be most easily and fully supplied by courses of Lectures delivered in different parts of the city, under the auspices of a Society, whose sanction may secure to the Lecturers employed, the confidence and resort of the public. It is proposed that the first courses of Lectures should be given to those who are engaged in Trade and Commerce; and that they should include the subjects of Universal Geography and Statistics, and of the Moral, Natural, Political, and Legal Sciences, so far as they may be connected with commercial transactions."

Thus each year the society arranged several public lectures on substantial themes, delivered by substantial thinkers such as Horace Mann

Horace Mann

Horace Mann was an American education reformer, and a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1827 to 1833. He served in the Massachusetts Senate from 1834 to 1837. In 1848, after serving as Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education since its creation, he was...

, George Bancroft

George Bancroft

George Bancroft was an American historian and statesman who was prominent in promoting secondary education both in his home state and at the national level. During his tenure as U.S. Secretary of the Navy, he established the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1845...

and Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...

. Among the lecture attendees was Caroline Healey Dall

Caroline Healey Dall

Caroline Wells Healey Dall was an American feminist writer, transcendentalist and reformer. She was affiliated with the National Women's Rights Convention, the New England Women's Club, and the American Social Science Association...

.

In addition, as part of the society's effort to improve the minds of its members, it published a reading list. The short list of titles "recommended to those members of the Society, who may seek any direction as to the matter and the course of their reading" consisted of:

David Hume
David Hume
David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...

's History of England
The History of England (David Hume)
The History of England is David Hume's great work on England's history was written in installments while he was serving as librarian to the Faculty of Advocates in Edinburgh. It was published in six volumes in 1754, 1756, 1759, and 1762. His History became a best-seller, finally giving him the...
Walter Scott
Walter Scott
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet was a Scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet, popular throughout much of the world during his time....

's History of Scotland
William Robertson
William Robertson (historian)
William Robertson FRSE FSA was a Scottish historian, minister of religion, and Principal of the University of Edinburgh...

's History of America
John Marshall
John Marshall
John Marshall was the Chief Justice of the United States whose court opinions helped lay the basis for American constitutional law and made the Supreme Court of the United States a coequal branch of government along with the legislative and executive branches...

's History of the American Colonies
Thomas Hutchinson's, George Richards Minot's and Alden Bradford
Alden Bradford
Alden Bradford was an American politician, clergyman and author who served as the 5th Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth. Born in Duxbury, MA, he graduated from Harvard in 1786 and received a degree of LL.D. there. He was then ordained as a Congregational church pastor, serving in...

's Histories of Massachusetts
Caleb Snow's History of Boston
William Gordon's American Revolution
Henry Lee's Southern Campaigns
John Marshall
John Marshall
John Marshall was the Chief Justice of the United States whose court opinions helped lay the basis for American constitutional law and made the Supreme Court of the United States a coequal branch of government along with the legislative and executive branches...

's Life of Washington
Washington Irving
Washington Irving
Washington Irving was an American author, essayist, biographer and historian of the early 19th century. He was best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle", both of which appear in his book The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. His historical works...

's A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus
Life of Franklin, James Otis, Patrick Henry, Josiah Quincy, Fulton, the Signers of the Declaration of Independence
1st vol. of Malte Brun
Conrad Malte-Brun
Conrad Malte-Brun , born Malthe Conrad Bruun, was a Danish-French geographer and journalist. His second son, Victor Adolphe Malte-Brun, was also a geographer.-Biography:...

's Geography
Timothy Flint's Valley of the Mississippi

William Paley
William Paley
William Paley was a British Christian apologist, philosopher, and utilitarian. He is best known for his exposition of the teleological argument for the existence of God in his work Natural Theology, which made use of the watchmaker analogy .-Life:Paley was Born in Peterborough, England, and was...

's Natural Theology
John Mason Good
John Mason Good
John Mason Good , English writer on medical, religious and classical subjects, was born at Epping, Essex.John Good's parents were the Nonconformist minister Revd Peter Good and Sarah Good, the daughter of another Nonconformist minister, Revd Henry Peyto of Great Coggeshall...

's Book of Nature
Jane Marcet
Jane Marcet
Jane Marcet was a successful writer of popular introductory science books.-Life:She was born in London, one of twelve children of the merchant and banker Anthony Francis Haldimand and his wife Jane , and was tutored at home with her brothers...

's Conversations on Vegetable Physiology and Elements of Botany
Isaac Ray
Isaac Ray
Isaac Ray was an American psychiatrist, one of the founders of the discipline of forensic psychiatry. In 1838, he published A Treatise on the Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity , which served as an authoritative text for many years....

's Conversations on Animal Economy
Stewart's and Thomas Brown
Thomas Brown (philosopher)
Thomas Brown FRSE was a Scottish metaphysician.He was born at Kirkmabreck, Kirkcudbright, where his father Rev. Samuel Brown was parish clergyman. He was a wide reader and an eager student...

's Philosophy of the Mind
Neil Arnott
Neil Arnott
Neil Arnott was a Scottish physician.Neil Arnott FRS was a distinguished graduate of Marischal College, University of Aberdeen and subsequently learned in London under Sir Everard Home , through whom he obtained, while yet in his nineteenth year, the appointment of full surgeon to an East Indiaman...

's Elements of Physicks
Jacob Bigelow's Technology
William Paley
William Paley
William Paley was a British Christian apologist, philosopher, and utilitarian. He is best known for his exposition of the teleological argument for the existence of God in his work Natural Theology, which made use of the watchmaker analogy .-Life:Paley was Born in Peterborough, England, and was...

's Moral Philosophy
Adam Ferguson
Adam Ferguson
Adam Ferguson FRSE, also known as Ferguson of Raith was a Scottish philosopher, social scientist and historian of the Scottish Enlightenment...

on Civil Society
William Blackstone
William Blackstone
Sir William Blackstone KC SL was an English jurist, judge and Tory politician of the eighteenth century. He is most noted for writing the Commentaries on the Laws of England. Born into a middle class family in London, Blackstone was educated at Charterhouse School before matriculating at Pembroke...

's Commentaries on the Laws of England
Commentaries on the Laws of England
The Commentaries on the Laws of England are an influential 18th-century treatise on the common law of England by Sir William Blackstone, originally published by the Clarendon Press at Oxford, 1765–1769...
1st vol. of James Kent
James Kent
James Kent was an American jurist and legal scholar.-Life:...

's Commentaries on American Law
Works of Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton
Alexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...
Alexander Hill Everett
Alexander Hill Everett
Alexander Hill Everett was a noted American diplomatist, politician, and Boston man of letters. His brother was Edward Everett....

's Europe and America
Jean-Baptiste Say
Jean-Baptiste Say
Jean-Baptiste Say was a French economist and businessman. He had classically liberal views and argued in favor of competition, free trade, and lifting restraints on business...

's Political Economy
Willard Phillips on Insurance

The society also donated money for purchase of books to Boston's Mercantile Library Association

Mercantile Library Association (Boston, Massachusetts)

The Mercantile Library Association of Boston was an organization dedicated to operating a subscription library, reading room and lecture series. Members included James T. Fields and Edwin Percy Whipple...

and the Mechanic Apprentices Library Association

Mechanic Apprentices Library Association (Boston, Massachusetts)

The Mechanic Apprentices Library Association of Boston, Massachusetts, functioned as "a club of young apprentices to mechanics and manufacturers .....

Lectures

1829
- Edward Everett: "The Biography of Franklin"
- Walter Channing
  Walter Channing (physician)
  Walter Channing was an American physician and professor of medicine.Born in Newport, Rhode Island, Channing entered Harvard in 1804, but left in 1807 on account of the “rebellion” of that year, and afterward received his degree out of course...
  
  : "On Physical Education, Including the History of the Ancient Gymnasium;" "On the Means of Promoting and Preserving the Health of Communities, and the History and Operation of Quarantine Law;" "Aqueducts or the Means and Advantages of Supplying Cities with Water"
- Francis Lieber
  Francis Lieber
  Francis Lieber , known as Franz Lieber in Germany, was a German-American jurist, gymnast and political philosopher. He edited an Encyclopaedia Americana...
  
  : "Causes of the Decline of the Turkish Empire"
- Chandler Robbins, M.D.: "Animal Mechanics"

1830
- Alexander H. Everett
  Alexander Hill Everett
  Alexander Hill Everett was a noted American diplomatist, politician, and Boston man of letters. His brother was Edward Everett....
  
  : "The History of Civilization"
- Alonzo Potter
  Alonzo Potter
  The Right Reverend Alonzo Potter was an American bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States who served as the third Bishop of Pennsylvania.-Early life:...
  
  : "The Theory of Morals"
- John Park: "On Sensation, the Source of Knowledge and the Means by Which Truth May Be Ascertained"
- William Sullivan: "The Constancy of Human Nature Illustrated by the Physical and Moral Character of War in the Past Ages"
- John Pickering: "Uncertainty of the Law"; "The Moral Sciences and Belles Lettres as Branches of Useful Knowledge"
- Davis: "On Natural Sciences"
- F.W.P. Greenwood
  F.W.P. Greenwood
  Francis William Pitt Greenwood was a Unitarian minister of King's Chapel in Boston, Massachusetts in the 19th-century.-Biography:...
  
  : "The Nature and Power of Moral Circumstances"; "On the Uses and Abuses of Books"
- James T. Austin
  James T. Austin
  James Trecothick Austin was the 22nd Massachusetts Attorney General. Austin was the son of Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth, and Treasurer and Receiver-General of Massachusetts Jonathan L. Austin...
  
  : "On the Modern History of Massachusetts"
- John Pierpont
  John Pierpont
  John Pierpont was an American poet, who was also successively a teacher, lawyer, merchant, and Unitarian minister. His most famous poem is The Airs of Palestine.-Overview:...
  
  : "On the Value of Human Knowledge"
- William J. Loring: "An Exposition on Some of the Elementary Principles of Political Economy"
- Theodore Lyman
  Theodore Lyman (militiaman)
  Theodore Lyman II was an American philanthropist, politician, and author, born in Boston, the son of Theodore Lyman and Lydia Pickering Williams. He graduated at Harvard in 1810, visited Europe , studied law, and with Edward Everett, revisited Europe in 1817-19...
  
  : "Remarks on the Principal Events of the French Revolution of 1789"

1831
- Benjamin A. Gould
  Benjamin Apthorp Gould
  Benjamin Apthorp Gould was a pioneering American astronomer. He is notable for creating the Astronomical Journal, discovering the Gould Belt, and for founding of the Argentine National Observatory and the Argentine National Weather Service.-Biography:He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, son of...
  
  : "On Switzerland-the Glaciers-and Other Phenomena of the Alps, together with Passes over those Mountains"
- J. V. C. Smith: "On the Natural History and Cultivation of the Honey Bee, as a Source of Domestic Economy"
- Enoch Hale: "On Nutrition and on Digestion"
- J. Greely Stevenson: "On the Varieties of Man"
- John C. Gray: "On Taxation and Revenue"
- Lemuel Shaw
  Lemuel Shaw
  Lemuel Shaw was an American jurist who served as Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court...
  
  : "On Laws of Property"
- Daniel Webster: "Introductory Lecture"
- Jacob Bigelow
  Jacob Bigelow
  Jacob Bigelow was an American medical doctor, botanist, and architect of Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.-Biography:...
  
  : "The Cemetery at Mount Auburn"; "Architecture"
- Francis C. Gray: "The Aborigines of America"; "Some Peculiarities of the American Form of Government"

1832
- Chandler Robbins: Health
- Gamaliel Bradford: "Apparitions"; "The Organs of Motion"
- Franklin Dexter: "The Moral Right of Parties to Suit at Law"
- J. Greely Stevenson: "The Cause of Diversities of Complexion and Figure in Mankind"
- Charles P. Curtis: "The Benefit to the Public from the Establishment of a Court of Chancery in Massachusetts"
- Enoch Hale: "Dews and Clouds"
- John Farrar
  John Farrar (scientist)
  John Farrar was an American scholar. He first coined the concept of hurricanes as “a moving vortex and not the rushing forward of a great body of the atmosphere”, after the Great September Gale of 1815. Farrar remained Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at Harvard University between...
  
  : "Natural Philosophy"
- Abraham Mason: "The Art of Wood Engraving"

1833
- John Pickering: "The Importance of the Study of Languages"; "Language Comprehending an Account of the Written Language of Ancient Egypt, Called Hieroglyphics, as Explained by Dr. Young and M. Champollion"; "Mexican and Peruvian Languages-and Telegraphic Languages"
- Jonathan Barber: "Elocution"
- Edward Everett: "Introductory Lecture"
- George Ticknor
  George Ticknor
  George Ticknor was an American academician and Hispanist, specializing in the subject areas of languages and literature. He is known for his scholarly work on the history and criticism of Spanish literature....
  
  : Shakespeare

1834
- John Farrar: Astronomy
- Caleb Cushing: "Man as the Agent and Object of Civilization"; "Moral and Intellectual Culture"; "Analysis of Social Organizations"; "Government"; "On Civilization and Social State of Christendom"; "The Fine Arts"

1835
- Caleb Cushing: "Woman"; "The Discovery and Colonization of America"
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Michel Angelo Buonarte"; "Martin Luther"; "John Milton"; "George Fox"; "The Biography of Edmund Burke"; English Literature; "Permanent Traits of the English National Genius"; "The Age of Fable"; "Chaucer"; "Shakespeare"; "Lord Bacon"; "Ben Jonson, Herrick, Herbert, and Wotton"

1836
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: "Ethical Writers"; "Modern Aspects of Letters"
- John Farrar: Astronomy
- Daniel Webster: "The Progress of Popular Knowledge"
- Theophilus Parsons: "The Progress and Prospects of Society"
- John C. Gray: "The Forest Trees of the United States"
- Rufus Choate
  Rufus Choate
  Rufus Choate , American lawyer and orator, was born in Ipswich, Massachusetts, a descendant of an English family which settled in Massachusetts in 1643. His first cousin, physician George Choate, was the father of George C. S. Choate and Joseph Hodges Choate...
  
  : "The Literature of the Sea"

1837
- William Sullivan
- Alexander Young: "The Pequot War of 1637"
- Charles W. Upham
  Charles Wentworth Upham
  Charles Wentworth Upham was a U.S. Representative from Massachusetts. Upham was also a member, and President of the Massachusetts State Senate, the 7th Mayor of Salem, Massachusetts, and twice a member of the Massachusetts State House of Representatives...
  
  : "Roger Williams"; "Hugh Peters"; "Sir George Downing"; "The British Navigation Act of 1651"
- Edward Everett: "Introductory Lecture"
- William H. Gardiner: "Ancient Mexico"
- George Putnam: "The Circuit of the Waters"
- Edward T. Channing
  Edward Tyrrel Channing
  Edward Tyrrel Channing was a professor at Harvard College, brother to the noted Unitarian preacher William Ellery Channing and physician Walter Channing, and cousin of author Richard Henry Dana, Sr.-Biography:...
  
  : "Modern Demonstrative Eloquence"; "Mental Habits of Writers"

1838
- Edward T. Channing: "Richard Steele and the Periodical Essays of Queen Anne's Time"; "Literary Decisions"; "The Education of an Orator"
- James Walker: "The Progress of Civilization as Affected by Systems of Philosophy"; "Materialism"; "Transcendentalism"; "Phrenology"; "Animal Magnetism"
- Horace Mann: "Education-Its Necessity"; "Education-Its Processes"; "Education-Its Objects"
- Jared Sparks
  Jared Sparks
  Jared Sparks was an American historian, educator, and Unitarian minister. He served as President of Harvard University from 1849 to 1853.-Biography:...
  
  : American Revolution

1839
- William Adam: "India"
- Francis C. Gray: English Language and Literature
- Orville Dewey
  Orville Dewey
  Orville Dewey was an American Unitarian minister.He was born in Sheffield, Massachusetts. His ancestors were among the first settlers of Sheffield, where he spent his early life, alternately working upon his father's farm and attending the village school. He was naturally thoughtful, and was...
  
  : "The Moral Philosophy of Human Life"; "The Moral Philosophy of History"

1840
- Convers Francis
  Convers Francis
  Convers Francis was a Unitarian minister from Watertown, Massachusetts.-Life and work:He was born the son of Susannah Rand Francis and Convers Francis, and named after his father. His sister, Lydia Maria, later became an important reformer.Francis studied to become a minister at Harvard Divinity...
  
  : "The Relation of Literature to the Time"; "The Interpretation of the Past"; "The Huguenots in America"
- John Brazer: "The Difference between English and Ancient Classical Poetry"
- John Quincy Adams
  John Quincy Adams
  John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...
  
  : "The Social Nature of Man and Its Influence upon the Moral Condition"
- William H. Simmons: "The British Poets"; "The Poetry of Milton"; "Cowper and the Satirical Poets"; "The Poetry of Byron"'
- Henry R. Cleveland: "Characters of Classical and Romantic Fiction"

1841
- Charles Francis Adams
  Charles Francis Adams, Sr.
  Charles Francis Adams, Sr. was an American lawyer, politician, diplomat and writer. He was the grandson of President John Adams and Abigail Adams and the son of President John Quincy Adams and Louisa Adams....
  
  : "Shakespeare""
- John Quincy Adams: "The Chinese War"
- Henry W. Bellows
  Henry Whitney Bellows
  Henry Whitney Bellows was American clergyman, and the planner and president of the United States Sanitary Commission, the leading soldiers' aid society, during the American Civil War...
  
  : "The Formation of Opinions"
- John S. Dwight
  John Sullivan Dwight
  John Sullivan Dwight was a Unitarian minister, transcendentalist and America's first influential classical music critic.-Biography:...
  
  : "The Musical Life"
- Henry Giles
  Henry Giles
  Henry Giles was a Unitarian minister and writer.-Biography:Born in County Wexford to a Roman Catholic family, Giles changed his religious belief several times, becoming a Protestant and a Dissenter, He studied for a time at the Royal Academical Institution of Belfast...
  
  : "The Poet Burns"; "The Poet Crabbe"
- Frederic Henry Hedge
  Frederick Henry Hedge
  Frederick Henry Hedge was a New England Unitarian minister and Transcendentalist. He was a founder of the Transcendental Club, originally called Hedge's Club, and active in the development of Transcendentalism.-Biography:...
  
  : "The Philosophy of Literature"
- William Mitchell: Astronomy
- John Lord: "Institutions of the Middle Ages"

1842
- George Bancroft: "American Independence: A Consequence of the Reformation-Mayhew"; "The French War, A War of Revolution"; "Increase of Despotic Power in the European World"; "Boston in 1765"
- Charles Eames: "The Spirit of American History"; "The Commercial System"; "The Unity and Result of Ancient History"
- Henry Giles: "Elements and Illustration of Irish Character"; "Byron"
- Francis C. Gray: "Shakespeare"
- Oliver Wendell Holmes
  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. was an American physician, professor, lecturer, and author. Regarded by his peers as one of the best writers of the 19th century, he is considered a member of the Fireside Poets. His most famous prose works are the "Breakfast-Table" series, which began with The Autocrat...
  
  : "Astrology and Alchemy"; "Medical Delusions of the Past"; "Homeopathy"
- Ephraim Peabody
  Ephraim Peabody
  Ephraim Peabody was a Unitarian clergyman from the United States.-Biography:...
  
  : "The British Power in India"
- Josiah Quincy: "Introductory Lecture"

1843
- Richard Henry Dana, Jr.
  Richard Henry Dana, Jr.
  Richard Henry Dana Jr. was an American lawyer and politician from Massachusetts, a descendant of an eminent colonial family who gained renown as the author of the American classic, the memoir Two Years Before the Mast...
  
  : "The Foundation of Influence"; "American Loyalty"
- E. T. Fitch: "Music as Fine Art"
- Edward Reynolds: Human anatomy
- Thaddeus W. Harris: "Zoology"

1847
- Louis Agassiz
  Louis Agassiz
  Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz was a Swiss paleontologist, glaciologist, geologist and a prominent innovator in the study of the Earth's natural history. He grew up in Switzerland and became a professor of natural history at University of Neuchâtel...
  
  : "The Alps and Glaciers"

History

Lectures

Further reading

American Library of Useful Knowledge