JORDAN, DAVID STARR ( 1S51—). An Ameri can educator, born at Gainesville, New York. lle entered Cornell University at its opening session in 1868, and having previously privately pursued studies in botany, was appointed, in 1870. an instructor in that science in the new institution After taking the degree of M.S. in 1S72, he was for one year professor of botany and biology in Lombard University. Galesburg, Ill. In the same year he became an assistant to the United States Fish Commission. and began under the direction of Agassiz the study of fishes, which has made him one of the foremost ichthyologists in the world. From 1S75 to 1879 he was professor of biology at Butler University, Indianapolis, hid., and in the latter year was elected to the chair of zoology at the University of Indiana at Bloom ington. of which he became president in 1885. His summers were spent in investigations and researches for the Fish Commission, with which his connection continued up to 1891. In 1879-81 he was a special agent for the United States Census, and in that capacity made a report of great value on the marine industries of the Pa cific Coast. In 1891, on the founding of Leland
Stanford Junior University, he became its first president. and under his able supervision the in stitution was successfully organized. In 1897 he was a special United States Commissioner to in vestigate the fur-seal fisheries in Alaska. In addition to valuable papers in the proceedings of various scientific societies. and in the reports of the United States Fish Commission and the Census Bureau. he has published a number of books, including A Manual of Vertebrate Animals of the Northern United States (1876): Science Sketches ( 1887 ) ; Fishes of North and America (4 vols.. 1896-99) ; Matka and Kotik ( 1897) : Footnotes to Evolution( 1898) ; Care and Culture of Men ( 1 Snq) ; The Innumerable Com pany (189S) : Imperial Democracy (1899); The Book of Knight and Barbara (1898) ; and The Food and Game Fishes of North America (1902).