Charles Sprague Sargent

Charles Sprague Sargent.

Charles Sprague Sargent (April 24,^[1] 1841 – March 22, 1927) was an American botanist. He was appointed in 1872 as the first director of Harvard University's Arnold Arboretum in Boston, Massachusetts, and held the post until his death. He published several works of botany. The standard botanical author abbreviation Sarg. is applied to plants he identified.

Early life

Sargent was the second son of Henrietta (Gray) and Ignatius Sargent, a Boston merchant and banker who grew wealthy on railroad investments. He grew up on his father's 130-acre (53-ha) estate in Brookline, Massachusetts.

He attended Harvard College, where he graduated in Biology in the class of 1862. Sargent enlisted in the Union Army later that year, saw service in Louisiana during the American Civil War, and was mustered out in 1865. He traveled in Europe for three years.

Career

Having returned to his family's Brookline estate, "Holmlea", Sargent took over its management as a horticulturist, influenced by his cousin Henry Winthrop Sargent and H. H. Hunnewell of Wellesley. Under his direction, the family estate became a landscape without flower beds or geometric arrangements, but rather a recreation of nature with winding lanes, overhanging branches, and a profusion of trees and shrubbery.

When in 1872 Harvard University decided to establish an arboretum, Prof. Francis Parkman, at that time a professor of horticulture at Harvard's recently established Bussey Institution, probably suggested his young neighbor Sargent for the position. By the end of 1872, Sargent became the first Director of the Arnold Arboretum, a post he held until his death. He was also Director of the Botanic Garden in Cambridge.^[2]

Marriage and family

On November 26, 1873, Sargent married Mary Allen Robeson (1853–1919). They had two sons and three daughters, one of whom married the architect Guy Lowell. Their son Charles S. Sargent went to New York, where he became a partner in a securities firm.

Portrait of Charles Sprague Sargent

Later career

Even by the standards of Boston society of the early 20th century, Charles Sprague Sargent was unusual. He was colder than the surrounding, and notoriously chilly, Boston society; had nothing to do with local government; and cared little for the social ills of his era.^[1] He concentrated on his arboretum, and always was at work during his waking hours. At the arboretum he worked with Frederick Law Olmsted, of the Olmsted Brothers, from master planning for the roads and plant collections, to small details such as the selection of tree plantings on Commonwealth Avenue.^[1]

In this career, Sargent came of age as a dendrologist and published extensively. His influence was felt nationally on the conservation of American forests (in particular the Catskills and Adirondacks). He was a member of the National Forest Commission (1896–97) under President Grover Cleveland, advising on the creation of 21 million acres of national forest reserves. In that position, he clashed with Gifford Pinchot: Sargent advocated for preserving the forests in a state of "wilderness", while Pinchot advocated for conserving the forests in a way that included sustainable, productive uses, including timber harvests.^[3] He was chairman of a commission to examine the Adirondack forests and devise measures for their preservation in 1885.^[1]

Sargent became professor of arboriculture at Harvard in 1879. He planned the Jesup Collection of North American Woods in the American Museum of Natural History of New York City in 1880.^[1]

In 1888 he became editor and general manager of the weekly Garden and Forest, "a journal of horticulture, landscape art, and forestry".^[1]

Publications

These include:

Catalogue of the Forest Trees of North America (Washington, D. C., 1880);
Pruning Forests and Ornamental Trees, translated from the French of A. Des Cars (Boston, 1881);
Reports on the Forests of North America (Washington, 1884);
The Woods of the United States, with an Account of their Structure, Qualities, and Uses (New York, 1885); and
The Silva of North America (12 vols., Boston, 1882-'8).^[1]

Legacy and honors

After Sargent's death in 1927, at an Arbor Day memorial ceremony, Massachusetts Governor Fuller planted a white spruce on the grounds of the Massachusetts State House in his memory, and noted:

"Professor Sargent knew more about trees than any other living person. It would be hard to find anyone who did more to protect trees from the vandalism of those who do not appreciate the contribution that they make to the beauty and wealth of our nation."^[1]

References

Notes

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Wilson, James Grant; Fiske, John, eds. (1900). "Sargent, Paul Dudley". Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.
↑ Dupree, A. Hunter (1988). Asa Gray, American Botanist, Friend of Darwin. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 348–349. ISBN 978-0-801-83741-8.
↑ M. Nelson McGeary. Gifford Pinchot: Forester – Politician. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1960. p. 39

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Charles Sprague Sargent.

Works by Charles Sprague Sargent at Project Gutenberg
Works by or about Charles Sprague Sargent at Internet Archive
Article, Plant Science Bulletin, 21 February 1975

History of botany

Fields and disciplines	Agriculture Biogeography Bryology Cladistics Comparative anatomy Cytology Economic botany Ethnobotany Floristics Forestry Genetic engineering Horticulture Lichenology Molecular phylogenetics Mycology Natural history Numerical taxonomy Paleobotany Palynology Phycology Phytochemistry Phytogeography Plant anatomy Plant ecology Plant genetics Plant morphology Plant pathology Plant physiology Pteridology

Institutions	Jardin des Plantes Natural History Museum, London Orto botanico di Padova Orto botanico di Pisa Rothamsted Research Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

Publications	Historia Plantarum and Causes of Plants of Theophrastus c. 300 BC De Plantis of Nicolaus of Damascus c. 1st-century BC De Materia Medica of Dioscorides c. 60 AD Naturalis Historia 77–79 AD De Vegetabilibus of Albertus Magnus c. 1256 Herbarum Vivae Icones 1530 Libellus De Re Herbaria Novus 1538 Kreütterbuch of Hieronymus Bock 1539 De plantis libri XVI of Caesalpino 1583 Stirpium Historiae 1583 Herball, or Generall Historie of Plantes 1597 Prodromus Theatrici Botanici 1620 Pinax theatri botanici 1623 Anatome Plantarum 1675 Anatomy of Plants 1682 Historia Plantarum of John Ray 1686–1704 De Sexu Plantarum Epistola 1694 Éléments de botanique 1694 Vegetable Staticks 1727 Systema Naturae 1735 Genera Plantarum 1737 Philosophia Botanica 1751 Species Plantarum 1753 Systema Naturae, 10th ed. 1758–9 Familles des Plantes 1763–4 Experiments Upon Vegetables 1779 Die Metamorphose der Pflantzen 1790 Traité d'Anatomie et de Physiologie Végétale 1802 Recherches Chimiques sur la Végétation 1804 Beyträge zur Anatomie der Pflanzen 1812 Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis 1824–73 Nepenthaceae Die Vegetabilische Zelle 1851 Vergleichende Untersuchungen 1851 On the Origin of Species 1859 Experiments on Plant Hybridization 1865 Die Vegetation der Erde 1872 Plantesamfund 1895 Pflanzengeographie auf Physiologischer Grundlage 1898 Variation and Evolution in Plants 1950 Ontogeny and Phylogeny 1977 An Integrated System of Classification of Flowering Plants 1981

Theories and concepts	Alternation of generations Cell theory Center of diversity Phylogenetic nomenclature Spontaneous generation Taxonomy Ultrastructure

Influential figures	Theophrastus c. 371–287 BC Pliny the Elder 23–79 AD Pedanius Dioscorides c. 40–90 AD Otto Brunfels 1464–1534 Hieronymus Bock 1498–1554 Valerius Cordus 1515–1544 William Turner 1515–1568 Rembert Dodoens 1517–1585 Andrea Cesalpino 1519–1603 Gaspard Bauhin 1560–1624 Joachim Jungius 1587–1657 John Ray 1623–1705 Nehemiah Grew 1628–1711 Marcello Malpighi 1628–1694 Joseph Pitton de Tournefort 1656–1708 Rudolf Jakob Camerarius 1665–1721 Stephen Hales 1677–1761 Bernard de Jussieu 1699–1777 Carolus Linnaeus 1707–1778 Michel Adanson 1727–1806 Jan Ingenhousz 1730–1799 Joseph Banks 1743–1820 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749–1832 Carl Ludwig Willdenow 1765–1812 Nicolas-Théodore de Saussure 1767–1845 Alexander von Humboldt 1769–1859 Aimé Bonpland 1773–1858 Thomas Nuttall 1786–1859 Joakim Frederik Schouw 1789–1852 Matthias Jakob Schleiden 1804–1881 Alexander Braun 1805–1877 George Engelmann 1809–1884 Asa Gray 1810–1888 August Grisebach 1814–1879 Joseph Hooker 1817–1911 Gregor Mendel 1822–1884 Nathanael Pringsheim 1823–1894 Wilhelm Hofmeister 1824–1877 Julius von Sachs 1832–1897 Eugenius Warming 1841–1924 William Gilson Farlow 1844–1919 Andreas Franz Wilhelm Schimper 1856–1901 Nikolai Vavilov 1887–1943 Barbara McClintock 1902–1992 G. Ledyard Stebbins 1906–2000 Eugene Odum 1913–2002 Arthur Cronquist 1919–1992

Related topics	Botanical garden Herbal Plant taxonomy History of plant systematics Systems of plant taxonomy Herbalism History of agricultural science History of agriculture History of biochemistry History of biotechnology History of ecology History of evolutionary thought History of genetics History of geology History of medicine History of molecular biology History of molecular evolution History of paleontology History of phycology History of science Natural philosophy Philosophy of biology Timeline of biology and organic chemistry

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Authority control	WorldCat Identities VIAF: 57397076 LCCN: n86847820 ISNI: 0000 0001 0975 7032 GND: 117619124 SELIBR: 275365 SUDOC: 09157949X BNF: cb106087211 (data) NLA: 35475899 Botanist: Sarg.

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