OSBORN, HENRY FAIRFIELD palae ontologist, was born at Fairfield (Conn.), Aug. 8, 1857. He gradu ated from Princeton university (1877) and continued his studies under Balfour and Huxley. His professorships have included natural history and anatomy at Princeton (1881-91) ; biology and zoology until 1910, and the deanship of the faculty of pure science (1892-1895) at Columbia university. Since 1910 he has held the research professorship in zoology at Columbia university. His connection with the American Museum of Natural History began as curator of the department of vertebrate palaeontology (1891 1910), and was followed by a number of offices till 1908, when he became president, which he still is (1929). Since 190o he has been connected with the U.S. Geological Survey, first as vertebrate palaeontologist and since 1924 as senior geologist. Among offices too numerous to mention, he has had important connections with the Canadian Geological Survey, the New York Zoological Society, and the Carnegie Institute. He declined the proffered secretary ship of the Smithsonian Institution.
The American Museum of Natural History extension school service, its unique exhibition halls, and the organization of a complete survey of the geological succession of the higher verte brates of North America are due to President Osborn's efforts. His extensive researches chiefly have concerned the palaeontology of the vertebrates. His publications have dealt with almost all groups of animals and reptiles, but have made especially important contributions to the knowledge of the rhinoceroses, horses, titano theres, and dinosaurs. He has founded a flourishing school of
vertebrate palaeontology which already includes the names of numerous brilliant younger men of science. He has done much towards the determination of relative ages of extinct mammals in North America, and has done important services in working out a correlation between the Tertiary and mammal horizons of Europe and America. He has also studied and written on the philosophical bearings of his work. He was called, by the Royal Society of Lon don at the time of his election to membership, "one of the most distinguished palaeontologists of our time." His scientific writings (1877-1928) in geology, palaeontology, anthropology and biology comprise 755 titles, including memoirs on extinct reptiles and mammals. Dr. Osborn died Nov. 6, 1935.
His books combine literary art and scientific information. Among the most important are : From the Greeks to Darwin (1894) Evolution of Mammalian Molar Teeth (1907); The Age of Mammals ( 191o) ; Huxley and Education (19I0) ; Men of the Old Stone Age (1915) ; Origin and Evolution of Life (1917) ; The Earth Speaks to Bryan (1925) ; Evolution and Religion in Education (1926) ; Creative Education and Man Rises to Par nassus (1927).
See "Eminent Living Geologists," Geological Magazine, London (1917), vol 4, pp. 193-196, new Series, Decade 6.