Peabody Museum
The Peabody Museum of Natural History, Yale University Herbarium
Division of Botany
Yale University
170 Whitney Avenue
New Haven, CT 06511
United States
Patrick Sweeney
Email: patrick.sweeney@yale.edu
Description:
The Yale University Herbarium in the Yale Peabody Museum’s Division of Botany is an internationally recognized repository with holdings of approximately 350,000 specimens from throughout the world. There are an estimated 5,000 type specimens. The collection is particularly rich in ferns, bryophytes and grasses, as well as in historically important materials from the early botanical collectors. In addition, it was the herbarium of record for the flora of southern New England from 1864 until 1955, when that function passed to the University of Connecticut at Storrs.
Materials of Special Interest:
The Yale University Herbarium holdings are mainly from North America, especially New England. However, it also holds collections from Mexico and Central America, South America, Europe and Asia, and a fewer number of specimens from Africa and Australasia. The strength of the collections is in pteridophytes, bryophytes and grasses, thanks to the work of curators Daniel Cady Eaton (1864–1895), Alexander Evans (1895–1947) and John Reeder (1947–1968).
Other major contributors to the collection include H. N. Bolander, W. H. Brewer, J. D. Dana, A. Eaton, F. J. Lindheimer, C. R. Orcutt, E. Palmer, C. C. Parry, C. G. Pringle, F. Tweedy, A. E. Verrill, S. Watson, and C. Wright.