Laurence Monroe Klauber
Template:Short description Script error: No such module "Template wrapper".Script error: No such module "Check for clobbered parameters".Laurence Monroe Klauber (December 21, 1883, in San Diego, California – May 8, 1968, in San Diego), was an American herpetologist and the foremost authority on rattlesnakes. He was the first curator of reptiles and amphibians at the San Diego Natural History Museum[1][2][3] and Consulting Curator of Reptiles for the San Diego Zoo.[4][5] He was also a businessman, inventor, and contributed to mathematics in his study of the distribution of prime numbers.
Biography
The youngest of Theresa Epstein and Abraham Klauber's twelve children, Klauber was born on December 21, 1883, in San Diego, California. He received his A.B. degree (Electrical Engineering) from Stanford University in 1908 and completed a Westinghouse graduate apprenticeship course in 1910. He married Grace Gould[1] in 1911, and in that same year began his career with San Diego Gas & Electric Company. He received an honorary LL.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1941.[6] Klauber died on May 8, 1968, in San Diego.[7]
Businessman and inventor
Before becoming a herpetologist, Klauber worked for many years with the San Diego Gas & Electric Company. He worked his way up in the company from his first job as electric sign salesman thru electrical engineering positions; ultimately he became president in 1947, then chairman of the board of directors, a position he held from 1950 until his retirement in 1953.[4] Klauber held eight U.S. patents (plus 2 jointly) for inventions relating to energy transmission.
Herpetology
In 1923, Dr. Harry M. Wegeforth of the newly opened San Diego Zoo asked Klauber to identify several species of snake recently acquired.[4] Even though reptiles were not much more than a hobby to him at the time, he took the job and eventually became Consulting Curator of Reptiles. In addition, he became a member of the Zoological Society's Board of Trustees in 1945, and served as its president from 1949 to 1951.[4] As curator, he dedicated the following 35 years of his life to the study of reptiles, and rattlesnakes in particular. The result of that considerable amount of time and amassed data was his magnum opus, the two-volume book entitled Rattlesnakes: Their Habits, Life Histories and Influence on Mankind, published in 1956. It is still considered to be the most complete and authoritative resource ever written on rattlesnakes.[8]
In his research and field work, Klauber is credited with describing 53 new taxa of reptiles and amphibians (such as Arizona elegans candida, Sonora palarostris, Pituophis catenifer pumilis, and Charina umbratica) and has been recognized by his fellow herpetologists by having had 14 new taxa named after him (such as Sonora annulata klauberi, Crotalus lepidus klauberi, Ensatina eschscholtzii klauberi, Hemidactylus klauberi, Hypsiglena ochrorhynchus klauberi, Sauromalus klauberi, Sphaerodactylus klauberi, and Terrapene nelsoni klauberi).[9] He donated approximately 36,000 specimens to the San Diego Natural History Museum, and his extensive personal library and field notes were donated there upon his death.
Klauber's rattlesnake collection, containing over 8,600 specimens, comprises the core of the museum's Herpetology Department collection; at over 9,300 rattlesnake specimens, it is one of the largest rattlesnake collections in the world.[10]
Mathematics
In the early 1930s, Klauber proposed a geometric arrangement of primes not unlike Ulam's spiral.[11] In 1932, Klauber presented a paper on a triangular, non-spiral matrix to the Mathematical Association of America demonstrating geometric regularity in the distribution of the primes.[12] The lines of primes in the Klauber triangle meet at 60° angles, while in an Ulam Spiral (1963), they meet at 90° angles.[13][14]
Klauber's interest in mathematics—and the extensive samples of rattlesnakes that he accumulated for study—led to his most significant contribution to herpetology, the application of statistical methods to aid in the classification of reptiles. He pioneered the use of quantitative analysis in herpetology to determine variation in snakes and to weigh the differences between species and subspecies.[15][16][17]
.jpg){kind=link}
Patents
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Method of soldering metals", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Repeating fuse apparatus", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Wishbone cross-arm construction for transmission-poles", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Oil-testing apparatus", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Automatic circuit-controlling apparatus", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Lightning arrester", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Automatic circuit-making switch for high-potential circuits", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M., "Circuit-making device", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
As co-author
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Klauber, Laurence M. & Ray C. Cavell, "Current-distributing apparatus", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
- <templatestyles src="Citation/styles.css"/>Template:Citation/make link, Symons, William H. & Laurence M. Klauber, "Remote-controlled switch for high-tension transmission-lines", issued Script error: No such module "auto date formatter".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
Society memberships
<templatestyles src="Div col/styles.css"/>
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
- American Chemical Society
- Ecological Society of America
- American Gas Association
- American Geographical Society
- American Mathematical Society
- American Museum of Natural History
- American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists (President, 1938–40)
- American Society of Civil Engineers
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers
- American Statistical Association
- California Academy of Sciences
- Fellow, American Institute of Electrical Engineers
- Mathematical Association of America
- Pacific Coast Electrical Association (President 1911, J-24)
- Pacific Coast Gas Association (President 1927–28)
- San Diego Society of Natural History
- Seismological Society of America
- Western Society of Naturalists
- Sigma Xi
- Tau Beta Pi
References
<templatestyles src="Reflist/styles.css" />
- ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ a b c d Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
- ↑ a b Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. Template:ISBN. (Klauber, p. 143).
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1". See also mention of work on triangular arrangement of primes in Klauber field notes of December 28, 1931 ("Recd today a very encouraging letter from Prof. E.T. Bell re originality of my triangle of primes."), December 31, 1931, and January 1, 1932.
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "Citation/CS1".
- ↑ Script error: No such module "citation/CS1".
Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".
External links
- Laurence M. Klauber biography, San Diego Natural History Museum
- Klauber Herpetological Library
- Eponymous species at Amphibian and Reptile Atlas of Peninsular California
- Works by Laurence M. Klauber at JSTOR
- Works by Laurence M. Klauber at Internet Archive
- A Century of Progress in the Natural Sciences, 1853-1953. California Academy of Sciences, 1955.
- Finding aid to the Laurence Monroe Klauber Collection, Online Archive of California.
- The San Diego Natural History Museum Research Library houses a significant collection of Laurence Klauber's papers, data notebooks, daily diaries, correspondence, ephemera, and photographs.
- Species Described by and for Laurence M. Klauber
Template:San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance Template:San Diego Natural History Museum