Joseph Dalton Hooker.

British Botanist 1817-1911

Joseph Dalton Hooker was one of the leading British botanists of the late nineteenth century. He was born in Halesworth, Sussex, and was the son of another great British botanist, Sir William Jackson Hooker (1785-1865). Hooker graduated with a degree in medicine from Glasgow University, where his father was a professor of botany. His father eventually held the position of Director of Kew Gardens in London and, through his leadership, made it one of the finest botanical gardens in the world, with an extensive collection of plants from the British colonies. In 1855 Joseph Hooker became assistant director of Kew Garden and became director when his father died in 1865.

Hooker is best known for his work in taxonomy, the science of classification, and plant geography, the science of plant distribution. These primary interests were shaped by his participation in...