Information compiled
by Carol Ann McCormick, November 2005.
The University of North Carolina Herbarium
has catalogued approximately 90 specimens that were collected
by, determined by, or annotated by J. E. Adams. As cataloguing
of the collection continues, more will be found. Specimens collected
by J.E. Adams are mostly from California, probably collected during
his days as a graduate student at the University of California,
Berkeley. To date we have catalogued few specimens collected by
Adams in North Carolina. Rather, his involvement in the Flora
of the Carolinas project was to identify plants collected by others.
The "Flora of the Carolinas" project culminated in the
publication of the Manual of the Vascular Flora of the Carolinas
in 1968.
Anonymous (1982) Joseph Edison
Adams. Castanea 47(1): 117-118.
JOSEPH EDISON ADAMS, a UNC [University
of North Carolina] professor emeritus of botany, died Sunday,
June 7, 1981, at North Carolina Memorial Hospital following
a heart attack. He was seventy-seven years old and taught at
UNC from 1925-1969.
A specialist in the taxonomy of vascular
plants, he was nationally known as co-author of the textbook,
Plants: An Introduction to Modern Botany. The text, co-authored
with V. A. Greulach, is widely used in the United States and
has been translated into several foreign languages. He also
wrote extensively on plant anatomy and plant morphology.
His lifelong research and graduate teaching
interest was in the classification and phylogeny of flowering
plants. His research and that of all his doctoral students was
directed to that effort. He was a challenging and stimulating,
as well as congenial, graduate adviser and seminar leader, an
outstanding lecturer, superbly organized, articulate, a master
of language and an excellent writer. He was a provocative, pithy,
professional scientist, who played a large role in the development
and excellence of this department in the 40’s and 50’s.
He was a member of the N.C. Academy of
Science, the Association of Southeastern Biologists, the Botanical
Society of America, and the American Association for the Advancement
of Science.
Born in Middletown, N.Y., Adams received
his bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan
and his masters from Columbia University. He received his doctorate
from the University of California at Berkeley.
Adams is survived by his wife, Katherine
Smith Adams; a son, John Evi Adams of Gainesville, Florida;
a daughter, Martha Adams Galli of Rome, Italy; a brother, W.
Leigh Adams of Pompano Beach, Florida; and two grandsons.
Publications:
J. E. Adams (1935) A Systematic study of
the genus Arctostaphylos Adans. Berkeley: Berkeley Press.
(Ph.D. thesis, University of California, Berkeley)
J. E. Adams (1940) A systematic study of
the genus Arctostaphylos Adans. Journal of the Elisha
Mitchell Scientific Society 56(1): 1-62.
V.A. Greulach and Adams, J. E. (1967) Plants:
an introduction to modern botany, 2nd ed. New York: Wiley.
