Adolph D. E. Elmer

Elmer was born on June 14, 1870 in Van Dyne, Wisconsin, United States,{{Harvcoltxt|Copeland|1949|p=1}}. to Jacob Van Dyne and Alvina Elmer. He was educated at Washington State College in 1899,{{Harvcoltxt|Herre|1945}}.{{Harvcoltxt|Thomas|1961}}. married Emma Osterman in 1902 and earned an A.M. from Stanford University in 1903 (or 1904).

Between 1896 and the year of the earning of his A.M., he collected numerous plants in Western United States (especially California){{Cite web|title=Elmer, Adolph Daniel Edward (1870-1942) on JSTOR|author=Natural History Museum (BM)|url=https://plants.jstor.org/stable/10.5555/al.ap.person.bm000329727|accessdate=21 May 2021}}{{refn|group="notes"|His name also appears in a list of plant collectors of the Kew Herbarium specimens published in 1901, as one who conducted activity in Washington Territory.{{Cite journal|title=A list of the collectors whose plants are in the herbarium of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, to 31st December, 1899|journal=Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information|volume=1901|year=1901|page=21|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/11627418}}}} then began describing new plant species, his name appearing in earlier numbers of {{ill|Botanical Gazette|de}} (e.g. Festuca idahoensis in 1903).{{Cite journal|last=Elmer|first=A. D. E.|authorlink=Adolph Daniel Edward Elmer|year=1903|title=New Western plants. I|journal=Botanical Gazette|volume=36|pages=53|doi=10.1086/328375|s2cid=84253482|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/29401084}}

In 1904, he went to the Philippines (an unincorporated territory of the United States at that time), where he consequently made his home through the life. He made extensive plant collections in the Philippines from 1904 to 1927, and also in Borneo. According to Albert William Christian Theodore Herre, Elmer Drew Merrill regarded Adolph Daniel Edward Elmer as the best plant collector working in the Philippines and Southwestern Asia until the beginning of WWII. Merrill gave such reputation with a proof, i.e. {{Harvcoltxt|Merrill|1929}}. He was editor of {{ill|Leaflets of Philippine Botany|species}}, where he published more than 1,500 new taxa.

Elmer and his wife, Emma Osterman Elmer, had once planned to leave American-controlled Manila and return to their homeland shortly before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor occurred.{{Cite news|title=Arlington News|newspaper=The Enterprise|volume=48|number=2|date=13 January 1944|page=7|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/671127310/|quote=Word was received indirectly through other relatives, that Mrs. Emma Osterman Elmer, at one time a resident of Arlington, is alive and seemingly well in the Philippines. It has been over a year since last hearing from her, and it was feared she was dead. Mrs. Elmer and her husband, a professor in the University of the Philippines for many years, planning to return shortly before Pearl Harbor. Later, Professor Elmer died in a concentration camp, and since that, no word had been received. Mrs. Elmer wrote that she was living in an apartment, but was under close watch at all times, she had good food and kind treatment.|accessdate=19 May 2021}}

The Japanese invasion succeeded it in no time and involved the couple, as well.

Adolph Elmer died on either April 17, 1942 or in July 1942, in the Santo Tomas Internment Camp in the Manila, Philippines, of natural causes. His private type collection, held in the Philippine National Herbarium, was destroyed about that time. Emma Osterman Elmer survived internment.

Many taxa are named in honor of Elmer, including {{ill|Zeuxine elmeri|species}} {{small|(Ames) Ames}} (syn. Adenostylis elmeri {{small|Ames}}{{Cite journal|last=Ames|first=Oakes|authorlink=Oakes Ames (botanist)|year=1912|title=Orchidaceae novae et criticae Insularum Philippinarum|journal=Leaflets of Philippine Botany|volume=5|page=1552|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/773843}}), {{ill|Begonia elmeri|species}} {{small|Merr.}} (syn. B. peltata {{small|Elmer}}, nom. illeg.),{{Cite journal|last=Elmer|first=A. D. E.|authorlink=Adolph Daniel Edward Elmer|year=1915|title=Two Hundred Twenty Six New Species―I|journal=Leaflets of Philippine Botany|volume=7|pages=2556f|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/779972}}{{Cite journal|last=Merrill|first=E. D.|authorlink=Elmer Drew Merrill|year=1918|title=New or noteworthy Philippine plants, XIII|journal=The Philippine Journal of Science: Section C. Botany|volume=13|number=1|page=39|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/51234442}} Castilleja elmeri {{small|Fernald}},{{Cite journal|last=Fernald|first=M. L.|authorlink=Merritt Lyndon Fernald|year=1898|title=Notes upon Some Northwestern Castilleias of the Parviflora Group|journal=Erythea: A Journal of Botany, West American and General|volume=6|page=51|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/6094158}} {{ill|Cynometra elmeri|species}} {{small|Merr.}}{{Harvcoltxt|Merrill|1929|p=98}}. (note that at least all of these four examples are based on Elmer's type specimens), and so on.

The genera Adelmeria (Zingiberaceae),{{cite book | last=Burkhardt | first=Lotte | title=Verzeichnis eponymischer Pflanzennamen – Erweiterte Edition |trans-title=Index of Eponymic Plant Names – Extended Edition | publisher=Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum, Freie Universität Berlin | year=2018 | isbn=978-3-946292-26-5 | url=https://doi.org/10.3372/epolist2018 |format=pdf |language=German |location=Berlin | doi=10.3372/epolist2018 | s2cid=187926901 |access-date=1 January 2021}} Elmera (Saxifragaceae),{{cite book | last=Quattrocchi | first=Umberto | title=CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names, Volume II, D–L | publisher=CRC Press | location=Boca Raton, Florida | year=2000 | isbn=978-0-8493-2676-9}} Elmerinula (Dothideomycetes), and Elmerobryum (Hypnaceae) are also named after him.{{Citation needed|date=May 2021}}

{{Botanist|Elmer}}

{{reflist}}

• {{Cite journal|last=Merrill|first=E. D.|authorlink=Elmer Drew Merrill|year=1929|title=Plantae Elmerianae Borneenses|journal=University of California Publications in Botany|volume=15|pages=1–316|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=b9UY33oL3BMC&q=Cynometra+elmeri}}
• {{Cite journal|last=Herre|first=Albert W.C.T.|authorlink=Albert William Herre|date=1945|title=Obituary: A.D.E. Elmer|journal=Science|volume=101|issue=2628|pages=477–478|doi=10.1126/science.101.2628.477|pmid=17735519}}
• {{Cite journal|last=Copeland|first=Edwin B.|authorlink=Edwin Copeland|year=1949|title=A. D. E. Elmer: Leaflets of Philippine Botany|journal=The Philippine Journal of Science|volume=78|number=1|pages=1–4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OmcbAAAAMAAJ&q=Elmer+1870+Van+Dyne,+Wisconsin}}
• {{Cite journal|last=van Steenis-Kruseman|first=M. J.|date=1950|title=Elmer, Adolph Daniel Edward|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/33912521|journal=Flora Malesiana|series=1|volume=1|pages=151–152}} - its supplemented version ([https://www.nationaalherbarium.nl/FMCollectors/E/ElmerADE.htm ElmerADE]) is available on the website of the National Herbarium of the Netherlands. Accessed: 21 May 2021.
• {{Cite journal|last=Thomas|first=John H.|authorlink=species:John Hunter Thomas|date=1961|title=The History of Botanical Collecting in the Santa Cruz Mountains of Central California|url=https://trees.stanford.edu/PDF/Thomas_1961.pdf|journal=Contributions from the Dudley Herbarium|volume=5|issue=6|page=154}}

• {{Cite journal|first=G.|last=Sayre|year=1975|title=Cryptogamae Exsiccatae: an annotated bibliography of exsiccatae of algae, lichens, hepaticae, and musci. V. Unpublished Exsiccatae: I. Collectors|journal=Memoirs of the New York Botanical Garden|volume=19|issue=3|page=317}}

• [https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/259 Details - Leaflets of Philippine botany]. Archived by Biodiversity Heritage Library. Accessed May 21, 2021.

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Category:1870 births

Category:1942 deaths

Category:Date of death unknown

Category:American botanists

Category:People from Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin

Category:Stanford University alumni

Category:Washington State University alumni

Category:American people who died in Japanese internment camps