To Paul and other malacobibliophiles,

Firstly, I am happy to see that Paul hasn't shuffled off this
electromagnetic coil.  His commentary is accurate and heuristic.  Without
concentrated, annotated sources, a researcher must languish in the halls of
(typically underendowed) libraries, pester colleagues for photocopies, and
generally proceed in a desultory fashion.  Just in the last week (honest,
now) I personally turned the pages of:

Binney, W. G., 1858.  The complete writings of Thomas Say on the conchology
of the United States.  pp 1-252 + vi + pls. i-lxxv. (mine lacks the plates).

Binney, W. G. and G. W. Tryon, Jr., 1864.  The complete writings of
Constantine Smaltz [sic] Rafinesque on Recent and fossil conchology.  pp
1-96 +7 + pls. LXX-LXXII. Ballière Bros., New York. (unattributed 1984
reprint).

Clench, W. J. and R. D. Turner, 1962.  New names introduced by H. A. Pilsby
in the Mollusca and Crustacea.  Acad Natural Sci Spec. Pub. 4: 1-218.

*Johnson, R. I., 1989.  Molluscan taxa of Addison Emery Verrill and
Katharine Jeannette Bush, including those introduced by Sanderson Smith and
Alpheus Hyatt Verrill. Occ. Pap. Moll. 5(67): 1-143. Aug. 30.

Scudder, N. P., 1885.  The published writings of Isaac Lea LL. D. Bull. U.
S. Nat. Mus. 29(23): 1-278 + lix. Sept.

Tryon, G. W., Jr. List of American writers on Recent Conchology with the
titles of their memoirs and their dates of publication. pp 1-68 (?missing
pp.). Ballière  Bros., New York. April 1.

**Wheeler, H. E., 1935.  Timothy Abbott Conrad, with particular reference
to his work in Alabama one hundred years ago.  Bull. Amer. Paleont. 23:
1-157 + i-x + portrait (P.R.I. reprint, 1977).

These works stand alongside the mostly British and Japanese giants Paul
cites in being essential and illuminating... and some are still
commercially available.  (link to Museum of Comparative Zoology for * and
to Paleontological Research Institution for ** through COA website, to
which you can link through our website below).

In the matter of cyber-bio-bibliography, I recommend C'L'er Kevin Cumming's
growing site
<http://www.inhs.uiuc.edu:80/~ksc/Malacologists/FamousMalacologists.html>
dedicated to historical aspects of non-marine malacology (admittedly mostly
Eastern U.S. naiad workers ("dead white men").  Kevin's email is
<[log in to unmask]>.  You can link to it from our homepage (below).

Harry


At 11:56 AM 9/18/99 +0900, you wrote:
>>         I wish we could publish a lot more information about "namers" on
our
>> list. Many of their lives and expliots are fascinating. Someday, one
>> would hope that one of the educational channels might do half hour
>> features illustrating these people. It would be a great service to
>> students now and in the future.
>
>Whenever a malacologist shuffles off this mortal coil, their significance
>in the scheme of things can be evaluated by the length of time it takes
>someone to write a bibliography of their work. Not an obituary - everyone
>gets one of those - but a proper bibliography with a list of new names and
>a biography attached. These exist in print for almost all authors whose
>outputs were more than negligible, and obtaining these books should be a
>major priority for anyone building even a modest library. Just off the top
>of my head, I can think of comprehensive bibliographies of the following by
>the following :
>A. A. Gould by R. I. Johnson (1964), W. H. Dall by Boss et al., and P.
>Bartsch by F. Ruhoff (1973) all published by the Smithsonian; H. and A.
>Adams (1992), J. R. Tomlin (1990), J. C. Melvill (including his work with
>Standen) (1987) and E. A. Smith (1993), all by A. Trew (National Museum of
>Wales); J. W. Mighels by R. I. Johnson (1949 : Occ. Papers in Moll., vol. 1
>(14); Linnaeus by H. Dodge (1952-59, pub. AMNH New York); W. Turton and W.
>Clark (1983 : Journ. Conch. vol. 31) and J. G. Jeffries by A. Waren; C. S.
>Lischke by R.. v. Cosel (1998 : The Yuriyagai vol. 6); R. T. Abbott by M.
>G. Harasewych (Nautilus) and T. Kuroda by the Hanshin Shell Club. There are
>many more, including partial ones (T. Okutani up to 1986 (I think) and T.
>Habe up to 1976 for example) and some are in preparation (E. von Martens
>has just been done, though I can't remember by whom; I heard that Alison
>Trew was doing all four Sowerbys, a mammoth task, but how far she got I
>don't know), and we should all tip our collective hats to the authors of
>these pivotal resource works.
>These books are brilliant; they contain all the names created by the author
>along with full bibliographical references, type localities and often the
>current location of the type material. The really good ones also have
>plates of the types, the most important thing one can include in shell
>books. Most also contain a brief biography, which is always fascinating
>reading. The best thing of all is that they are CHEAP. Considering the
>amount of work involved in their compilation and their usefulness to even
>beginner collectors, they are scandalously underpriced.
>Another useful kind of book is the 'Collected Works'; facsimiles of the
>original articles of a particular author, often with an index to the new
>names. These exist for Monterosato, Oyama, Yokoyama and many others.
>
>It would be nice to have an online bibliography of bibliographies - perhaps
>there is one somewhere. It would be of great use to us all.
>