Abstract Detail

History of Botany in the Rhode Island Area

Tucker, Gordon C. [1].

Irene Stuckey: a Life Well Spent with Plants and People.

Irene H. Stuckey (1911-2001) was born in Georgia, where her father was a horticulturist and later director of the Georgia Agricultural Experiment Station. She received her undergraduate degree from Vanderbilt University and her Ph.D. in 1936 from Cornell University. Her entire professional career was spent at the University of Rhode Island. She was a research professor at the State Agricultural Experiment Station at the URI campus in Kingston. At first, her research focused on pasture grasses and pasture improvement. Later, as the importance of agriculture in the state declined, her research interests moved to tidal marsh plants and later to endangered plant species. She collaborated with several colleagues to produce an authoritative reference on the state’s plant life, Vascular Flora of Rhode Island: A List of Native and Naturalized Plants in 1998. In addition to numerous journal articles, Stuckey’s public service and outreach for the university were diverse and substantial. During World War II, she was involved in efforts at soil stabilization at the Quonset Naval Air Station. She regularly led wildflower walks in West Greenwich and Block Island into her retirement. She was also well known for her lectures on local plant life, as well as a popular publication, Wildflowers of Rhode Island, which included her own photographs of nearly 50 species. Her photographic skills again combined with her writing skills, as she contributed a series of articles on coastal plants for "Maritimes" (a popular monthly publication of the URI School of Oceanography), from 1975-1995. These authoritative, lucid articles were well received and eventually published as her magnum opus, Coastal Plants from Cape Cod to Cape Canaveral (co-authored with Lisa Lofland Gould in 2000).

Broader Impacts:

1 - Eastern Illinois University, Biological Sciences, 600 Lincoln Ave., Charleston , IL, 61920, USA

Keywords:
Irene Stuckey
Rhode Island
rare plants.

Presentation Type: Symposium or Colloquium Presentation
Session: SY4
Location: Ballroom B/Convention Center
Date: Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010
Time: 10:00 AM
Number: SY4006
Abstract ID:378