Sheldon, Edmund Perry, 1869-1913

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Biographical History

Edmund Perry Sheldon was born in 1869. After receiving his B.S. at the University of Minnesota, Sheldon moved to Oregon in 1897. There he worked in the eastern part of the state as a special field agent for the Division of Botany in U.S. Department of Agriculture. Sheldon later gained recognition for his forestry expertise when he was chosen to take charge of the Oregon State Exhibit of Forestry at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis in 1904. Later he was appointed superintendent of forestry at the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition in Portland in 1905. Sheldon was noted for being able to relate to both to amateur naturalists and to more formally trained academics. He spent time in the field while accompanying Martin Gorman and Lester Hawkinson several "rambles" through the forest in search of natural history specimens. During 1906-1908 Sheldon served as President of the Oregon State Academy of Science (OSAS) and curator of the City Free Museum in Portland which house his personal herbarium. He also served as Secretary of the newly formed Oregon State Board of Forestry until 1909. In 1913, Sheldon was elected President of the Mazamas, a mountaineering education organization located in Portland, and returned to working with the OSAS in the role of Secretary. Shortly after, Sheldon left Portland and was never heard from again. His whereabouts following 1913 are unknown, though his death is often listed as 1913.

Source

  • Read, R. T. In Pursuit of Professionalism: The Oregon State Academy of Sciences, 1905-1914. Oregon Historical Quarterly, Vol. 90, No. 2 (Summer, 1989), pp. 167-198
  • Harvard University Herbarium (HUH) Botanist Index. Accessed October 12, 2010. http://asaweb.huh.harvard.edu:8080/databases/botanist_index.html.
  • Read, Richard T. (1989). In pursuit of professionalism: The Oregon State Academy of Sciences, 1905-1914. Oregon Historical Quarterly, 90 (2), 167-198. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/20614242

Related entities

  • Eggleston, Willard Webster: author with whom Sheldon published
  • United States Dept. of Agriculture: He was a special field agent for the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Birth Date

1869

Death Date

1913

Topic

Botany

Form/Genre

Personal name

Occupation

Botanists