Edward William Nelson
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
naturalist
Natural history
Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...
and ethnologist
Ethnology
Ethnology is the branch of anthropology that compares and analyzes the origins, distribution, technology, religion, language, and social structure of the ethnic, racial, and/or national divisions of humanity.-Scientific discipline:Compared to ethnography, the study of single groups through direct...
. He was born in Manchester, New Hampshire
Manchester, New Hampshire
Manchester is the largest city in the U.S. state of New Hampshire, the tenth largest city in New England, and the largest city in northern New England, an area comprising the states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. It is in Hillsborough County along the banks of the Merrimack River, which...
. In 1871 together with his family, he became homeless due to the Chicago Fire.
In 1877 Nelson joined the U.S. Army Signal Corps. Spencer Fullerton Baird
Spencer Fullerton Baird
Spencer Fullerton Baird was an American ornithologist, ichthyologist and herpetologist. Starting in 1850 he was assistant-secretary and later secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C...
was responsible for selecting Signal Officers for the remoter stations, and would choose men with scientific training who were prepared to study the local flora and fauna. Baird sent Nelson to St. Michael, Alaska
Alaska
Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...
.
Nelson was the naturalist on board the USRC Corwin
USRC Thomas Corwin (1876)
The Thomas Corwin was a United States Revenue Cutter and subsequently a merchant vessel. These two very different roles both centered on Alaska and the Bering Sea...
, which sailed to Wrangel Island
Wrangel Island
Wrangel Island is an island in the Arctic Ocean, between the Chukchi Sea and East Siberian Sea. Wrangel Island lies astride the 180° meridian. The International Date Line is displaced eastwards at this latitude to avoid the island as well as the Chukchi Peninsula on the Russian mainland...
in search of the USS Jeanette
USS Jeannette (1878)
The first USS Jeannette was originally HMS Pandora, a Philomel-class gunvessel of the Royal Navy, and was purchased in 1875 by Sir Allen Young for his arctic voyages in 1875-1876. The ship was purchased in 1878 by James Gordon Bennett, Jr., owner of the New York Herald; and renamed Jeannette...
in 1881. Nelson published his findings in the Report upon Natural History Collections Made in Alaska between the Years 1877–1881 (1887). He also published his ethnological findings in The Eskimo about Bering Strait (1900).
In 1890 Nelson accepted an appointment as a Special Field Agent with the Death Valley
Death Valley
Death Valley is a desert valley located in Eastern California. Situated within the Mojave Desert, it features the lowest, driest, and hottest locations in North America. Badwater, a basin located in Death Valley, is the specific location of the lowest elevation in North America at 282 feet below...
Expedition under Clinton Hart Merriam
Clinton Hart Merriam
Clinton Hart Merriam was an American zoologist, ornithologist, entomologist and ethnographer.Known as "Hart" to his friends, Dr. Clinton Hart Merriam was born in New York City in 1855. His father, Clinton Levi Merriam, was a U.S. congressman. He studied biology and anatomy at Yale University and...
, Chief of the Division of Ornithology and Mammalogy, United States Department of Agriculture
United States Department of Agriculture
The United States Department of Agriculture is the United States federal executive department responsible for developing and executing U.S. federal government policy on farming, agriculture, and food...
. After this expedition he was ordered to conduct a field survey in Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, and Nelson remained in the country for the next fourteen years. Nelson continued to work for the Bureau of Biological Survey until 1929, being Chief of the Bureau from 1916 to 1927.
Nelson's Milksnake
Nelson's Milksnake
The Nelson's Milksnake is a type of king snake that is found in Mexico from southern Guanajuato and central Jalisco to the Pacific Coast. It is also found on the narrow plains of northwestern Michoacán and on the Tres Marias Islands...
was named in his honor. The holotype
Holotype
A holotype is a single physical example of an organism, known to have been used when the species was formally described. It is either the single such physical example or one of several such, but explicitly designated as the holotype...
was collected by Nelson and Edward Alphonso Goldman
Edward Alphonso Goldman
Edward Alphonso Goldman was an American zoologist. He worked extensively in Mexico with Edward William Nelson and described and revised many groups of mammals....
on July 18, 1897. He worked with Goldman for ten years surveying Mexican
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
terrestrial
Terrestrial animal
Terrestrial animals are animals that live predominantly or entirely on land , as compared with aquatic animals, which live predominantly or entirely in the water , or amphibians, which rely on a combination of aquatic and terrestrial habitats...
vertebrate
Vertebrate
Vertebrates are animals that are members of the subphylum Vertebrata . Vertebrates are the largest group of chordates, with currently about 58,000 species described. Vertebrates include the jawless fishes, bony fishes, sharks and rays, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds...
s. Rodent
Rodent
Rodentia is an order of mammals also known as rodents, characterised by two continuously growing incisors in the upper and lower jaws which must be kept short by gnawing....
s named in his honor include Oryzomys nelsoni, Xenomys nelsoni, Ammospermophilus nelsoni, Heteromys nelsoni, Dicrostonyx nelsoni, Dipodomys nelsoni, Megadontomys nelsoni, Neotoma nelsoni and Nelsonia.