Clair Alan Brown

Brown was born in Port Allegany, Pennsylvania, to Charles Melvin and Jennie Burroughs Brown, one of four sons.{{cite news|title=Charles M. Brown, Pt. Allegany, dies after long illness|newspaper=The Bradford Era|location=Bradford, Pennsylvania, USA|date=1952-04-30|page=5|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/58084520/the-bradford-era/|via=newspapers.com}} He earned his bachelor's degree cum laude from New York State College of Forestry in 1925 and his Master's in botany from the University of Michigan in 1926. He began working at Louisiana State University (LSU) the following year before returning to the University of Michigan for his doctorate, which he completed in 1934. His dissertation was titled Morphology and biology of some species of Odontia.{{cite web|url=https://www.worldcat.org/title/017240722|title=Morphology and biology of some species of Odontia|date=1935|publisher=WorldCat|access-date=2022-11-09}} He took up his position at LSU again and taught botany, systematic botany, wood identification, dendrology, forest pathology, ecology, and palynology until his retirement in 1970.{{cite news|title=Retiring LSU professor gets honor from national group|newspaper=The Daily Advertiser|location=Lafayette, Louisiana, USA|date=1970-08-21|page=8|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825486/the-daily-advertiser/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}}

He held a number of leadership roles in international organizations throughout his career, including as president of the Southern Weed Control Conference in 1948;{{cite journal|title=News and Notes|journal=Science|year=1948 |volume=108|number=2813|pages=610–614 |doi=10.1126/science.108.2813.610 |jstor=1676700 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1676700}} as a delegate to the International Botanical Congress in 1950;{{cite news|title=Greatest array of horticultural talent here for convention talks|newspaper=Clarion-Ledger|location=Jackson, Mississippi, USA|date=1959-05-03|page=20|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825211/clarion-ledger/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}} and as president of the American Fern Society in 1960.{{cite journal|title=American Fern Society|journal=American Fern Journal|volume=50|number=2|date=April 1960|pages=209, 212}} He was also appointed to the International Committee on Palynology and was president of honor at the 78th Société botanique de France.{{citation needed|date=November 2022}} Among his awards were a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1952, a National Science Foundation fellowship in 1961,{{cite news|title=Wins fellowship|newspaper=The Times|location=Shreveport, Louisiana, USA|date=1961-04-29|page=19|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825616/the-times/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}} and an Edmund Niles Huyck Fellowship. In 1973, he received a Louisiana Literary Award for his illustrated anthology Wildflowers of Louisiana and Adjoining States.{{cite news|title=Brown cited for book on wildflowers|newspaper=The Times|location=Shreveport, Louisiana, USA|date=1973-03-31|page=2|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825349/the-times/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}}

Brown married Maude Nichols on September 4, 1926{{citation needed|date=November 2022}} and they had two daughters, Sarah and Dorcas.{{cite journal|title=American Fern Society|volume=48|number=1|date=January 1958|page=62|jstor=1544901 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1544901|last1=Wiggins |first1=Ira L. |last2=Wagner |first2=Warren H. |last3=McGregor |first3=Ronald L. |last4=Horr |first4=W. H. |last5=Duncan |first5=Ellen S. |last6=Faust |first6=Mildred E. |last7=Lommasson |first7=R. C. |last8=Luhr |first8=Dorothea |journal=American Fern Journal }} Maude and nineteen-year-old Sarah died in a car accident in April 1962.{{cite news|title=Easter vacation ends in tragedy for two women|newspaper=Daily World|location=Opelousas, Louisiana, USA|date=1962-04-24|page=1|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825456/daily-world/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}}{{cite news|title=Rites conducted for victims of accident|newspaper=The Post-Standard|location=Syracuse, New York, USA|date=1962-04-27|page=33|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/112825655/the-post-standard/|via=newspapers.com|access-date=2022-11-09}}

Brown died on March 24, 1982, in Baton Rouge.{{cite journal|title=American ecologists: A biographical bibliography|last=Burgess|first=Robert L.|date=1996|journal=Huntia|volume=10 |issue=1 |url=https://www.huntbotanical.org/admin/uploads/02hibd-huntia-10-1-pp5-116.pdf|access-date=2022-11-09|page=19|pmid=11619260 }}

{{botanist|C.A.Br.|inline=yes}}

• With Donovan Stewart Correll (1908–1983) Ferns and Fern Allies Trees & Shrubs. 1942
• Louisiana Trees & Shrubs. 1945
• Vegetation of the Outer Banks of North Carolina. 1959
• Palynological Techniques. 1960
• Wildflowers of Louisiana & Adjoining States. Ed. Louisiana State University Press. 259 pp. {{ISBN|0-8071-0780-8}}, 1980

• Allen G. Debus (dir.) (1968). World Who's Who in Science. To Biographical Dictionary of Remarkable Scientists from Antiquity to the Present. Marquis-Who's Who (Chicago) : xvi + 1855 pp.

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Category:20th-century American botanists

Category:1982 deaths

Category:American mycologists

Category:1903 births

Category:University of Michigan alumni