Organisation(s)
F (main), AAU, BUT, DS (currently CAS), FH (currently GH), GH, L, LCU, LL (currently TEX), MICH, MO, NY, P, PC, S, SP, TEX, US
Associate(s)
Böhm, W. (fl. 1935) (co-collector)
Daily, William Allen (1912-) (co-author)
Richards, James Donald (Don) (1920-1980) (co-collector)
Biography
American algologist. Francis Drouet was born in Philadelphia, but spent most of his childhood and adolescence in Independence, Missouri. He earned his BA, MA and PhD degrees in botany from the University of Missouri. His initial interests were in flowering plants, but he soon became fascinated with blue-green algae, and made contributions to both disciplines in his earliest publications (1930-1936). His later papers and books dealt almost exclusively with blue-green algae, which he studied in the field, from cultures, and in the herbarium.
After completing his degree programme, he remained at the University of Missouri as a herbarium assistant until 1935 when he accepted an invitation from the Brazilian government to assist as a botanist in a fish culture programme.
In 1938 he won a Seessel fellowship to study botany at Yale University. After two years at Yale, he was appointed Curator of the Cryptogamic Herbarium at the Chicago Field Museum of Natural History, a post he held for 20 years. During his tenure at Chicago, he published his first monograph, Revision of the Coccoid Myxophyceae, in collaboration with W.A. Daily. He was also a member of the first team of biologists sent to New Mexico to determine the possible effects of atomic radiation on the biota around Los Alamos. The latter experience led to his becoming a research associate at New Mexico Highlands University in 1958 and the next year professor of botany at the University of Arizona.
In 1961 he joined the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia as a research fellow and curator of the Algal Herbarium. For the next 21 years, he worked on the remaining four volumes of his monograph series on the blue-green algae. Shortly before his death, he also completed a summary of the family Myxophyceae.
Sources:
H.S. Forest, 1983, "Francis Drouet (March 1, 1907-December 5, 1982)", Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club, 110(2): 231
C.W. Reimer, 1983, "Francis (Elliott) Drouet (1907-1982)", Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 135: 267-268.
References
Brummitt, R.K. & Powell, C.E., Authors Pl. Names (1992): 175; Knobloch, I.W., Phytologia Mem. 6 (1983): 23, 114; Knobloch, I.W., Pl. Coll. N. Mexico (1979): 13; Lanjouw, J. & Stafleu, F.A., Index Herb. Coll. A-D (1954): 82, 168, 757;
