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fl 1955
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1851-1934
Franz Arthur Friedrich Schuster was a German-born British Physicist known for his work in spectroscopy, electrochemistry, optics, X-radiography and the application of harmonic analysis to physics
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1829-1913
Sclater was born at Tangier Park, Wootton St Lawrence, Hampshire, where his father William Lutley Sclater had a country house. George Sclater-Booth, 1st Baron Basing was his elder brother. Philip grew up at Hoddington House where he took an early interest in birds. He was educated in school at Twyford, Winchester College and Corpus Christi, Oxford, where he studied scientific ornithology. In 1851 he began to study law and was admitted as a Fellow of Corpus Christi College. In 1856 he travelled to America and visited Lake Superior and the upper St. Croix River. Sclater wrote about this in his 'Illustrated Travels'. In Philadelphia he met Spencer Baird, John Cassin and Joseph Leidy at the Academy of Natural Sciences. After returning to England, he practiced law for several years and attended meetings of the Zoological Society of London.
In 1858 Sclater published a paper in the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, setting up six zoological regions which he called the Palaeartic, Aethiopina, Indian, Australasian, Neartic and Neotropical, which are still in use. He also developed the theory of Lemuria during 1864 to explain zoological coincidences relating to Madagascar to India.
He was Secretary of the Zoological Society of London for 42 years, from 1860-1902. He was briefly succeeded by his son, before the Council of the Society made a long-term appointment.
In 1874 he became private secretary to his brother George Sclater-Booth, MP. In 1875 he became President of the Biological Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, where he joined in 18447 as a member. He was elected as a member to the American Philosophical Society in 1873.
Sclater was the founder and editor of 'The Ibis', the journal of the British Ornithologists' Union. His office at 11 Hanover Square became a meeting place for all naturalists in London.
His collection of birds grew to nine thousand and he transferred them to the British Museum in 1886. At around the same time the museum was augmented by the collections of Gould, Salvin and Godman, Hume and others to become the largest in the world.
Among Sclater's books were 'Exotic Ornithology' (1866-1869), 'Nomenclator Avium' (1873), 'Argentine Ornithology' (1888-1889) and 'The Book of Antelopes' (1894-1900).
In June 1901 he received an honorary doctorate of Science from the University of Oxford.
In 1862 he married Jane Eliza Hunter Blair and they had one daughter and four sons. Their eldest son, William Lutley Sclater was also an ornithologist. Philip Sclater is buried in Odiham Cemetery.
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1863-1944
Son of Philip Lutley Sclater and Jane Anne Eliza, the daughter of Sir David Hunter-Blair. He received his Master of Arts degree in Natural Science from Keble College, Oxford in 1885. He worked for two years as a Demonstrator at Cambridge and went on a collecting trip to British Guiana in 1886. He published about birds in the Ibis in 1887. In the same year he received an appointment as a deputy superintendent of the Indian Museum in Calcutta until 1891 when he joined the science faculty of Eton College. Sclater then took up the position of curator at the South African Museum, During his time in South Africa he continued his scientific writings, including the completion of the work 'Flora and Fauna of South Africa. In 1906, following a dispute with the Museum's board of trustees, Sclater resigned as curator. He travelled through Mombasa, Lake Victoria, Khartoum and Cairo before returning to England. He then moved to Colorado Springs, Colorado, which had been founded by his wife's brother-in-law, General William Jackson Palmer. Palmer offered Sclater a small estate outside the city and a professorship at Colorado College where he helped in reorganising the museum. When the general died in 1909, the couple returned to England.
From 1909 Sclater became curator of the Bird Room at the Natural History Museum. While working there he compiled the 'Systema Avium Aethiopicarum' (1924-1930). He worked there until his death.
In 1912 Sclater published 'A History of the Birds of Colorado' in two volumes. During World War One he volunteered for the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association.
Sclater was editor of 'Ibis' from 1913-1930, editor of the Zoological Record from 1921-1937, President of the British Ornithologist's Union from 1928-1933, and Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society 1931-1943. In 1930 he was awarded the Godman-Salvin God Medal. Known mainly for his work with birds, Sclater also described several new species of amphibians and reptiles. Four new species of snake were described by him in a single paper in 1891.
It was at Eton that he met his future wife, Charlotte Mellen Stephenson, an American divorcee whose two sons attended the school. They were married at St George's Cathedral in 1896. Both his stepsons were killed in action during World War One. In 1942 Charlotte died of injuries sustained during the bombing of London. In 1944 Sclater died at St George's Hospital, two days after a bomb fell on his home.
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1908-
Carpenter and Zoo Technician at ZSL London Zoo
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1855-
Labourer and Watchman at ZSL London Zoo
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1923-
Children's Zoo Kiosk and Zoo Shop Assistant at ZSL London Zoo
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fl 1925
Pathologist at ZSL London Zoo
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fl 1949