Fred Jay Seaver records

Fred Jay Seaver (1877-1970) was a mycologist and authority on the taxonomy and life histories of the discomycetes (cup fungi). Born 14 March 1877 in Webster Co., Iowa, Dr. Seaver received his B.S. (1902) from Morningside College in Sioux City and his M.S. (1904) and Ph.D. (1912) in biology at the State University of Iowa. In 1903 he worked for a brief period under J. C. Arthur at Purdue University. Early in his career he held appointments as an instructor of biology at Iowa Wesleyan University (1905-06) and assistant professor at the State University of North Dakota in Fargo (1907-08) where he served as mycologist to its Experiment Station under Professor H. L. Bolley. His Ph.D. thesis, Hypocreales of North America, was published in Mycologia (1909-10), for which he served as editor for nearly 40 years, and in the North American Flora, 1910.

Dr. Seaver was associated with the New York Botanical Garden for most of his professional life, first through a fellowship to Columbia University in 1906. The NYBG appointed him Director of Laboratories (1908-1911), after which he held the positions of Curator (1912-1943), Head Curator (1943-1948), and Curator Emeritus (1948-). For the journal Mycologia he served as Associate Editor (1909-24), Editor (1925-32), Editor-in-Chief (1933-45), and Managing Editor (1933-47). He collaborated with NYBG Director Nathaniel Lord Britton on the botany of the Caribbean and contributed mycological sections to Flora of Bermuda (1918), The Bahama Flora (1920), and Botany of Porto Rico and the Virgin Islands(1926). Among his associates in the mycological study of the Caribbean were Carlos Chardon, J. M. Waterston, and H. H. Whetzel.

Dr. Seaver studied and published on a diversity of fungi from Colorado, Iowa, North Dakota, and New York, specializing in the Pezizales, Helotiales, and Hypocreales. In 1928 he published his magnum opus, North American Cup-fungi (Operculates). A supplement was issued in 1942, and a second volume, North American Cup-fungi (Inoperculates) was released in 1951. He was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Botanical Society of America, the Mycological Society of America, and the Torrey Botanical Club (Vice-president, 1943; President, 1945). In 1955 the NYBG presented him with its Distinguished Service Award. Upon retirement in 1948 he made his home in Winter Park, Florida, where he died 21 December 1970.