[244] As a scientific writer who participated in both the popular and academic worlds, he occupied a similar role to the role later occupied by Stephen Jay Gould. In 1949, he founded a tropical research station in Trinidad and Tobago which he named Simla, and which remains in operation as part of the Asa Wright Nature Centre. [178], Although Beebe attempted to ensure that Barton would receive credit as the Bathysphere's inventor and Beebe's fellow diver, the popular media tended to ignore Barton and pay attention only to Beebe. William Thomas Beebe. [211] Beebe described his experiences at Rancho Grande in his 1949 book High Jungle, which was the last of Beebe's major books. A. Milne, who wrote of Half Mile Down "I don't know which I envy you most: all those moral and physical qualities which you have and I lack, or all that wonder of a new world. [85] Obtaining a divorce in Reno required a person to demonstrate that their spouse had committed either adultery or extreme cruelty; Blair's complaint accused Beebe of the latter,[86] claiming that during the pheasant expedition he had threatened to commit suicide by "throwing himself in the river, shooting himself through the roof of the mouth with a revolver, and by cutting his throat with a razor. [71] By the time they left Sarawak, the conflict between Beebe and Horsfall had grown to such a degree that Beebe decided Horsfall was endangering the expedition and must be sent home. [99] During his first season at Kalacoon in 1916, Beebe brought back 300 living specimens for the zoo. Beebe and Barton made a deal: Barton would pay for the sphere and all of the other equipment to go with it. [179] Barton was often resentful of this, believing Beebe to be deliberately hogging the fame. [47] With his many writings about the dangers of environmental destruction, Beebe helped to raise public awareness about this topic. [24], Beebe nonetheless exhibited a high degree of loyalty to those employees who were capable of meeting his standards. [192], During the two Zaca expeditions Beebe was accompanied by his longtime assistant John Tee-Van as well as Jocelyn Crane, a young carcinologist who had first worked for Beebe at Nonsuch Island in 1932,[193] and who would subsequently be among Beebe's most cherished associates for the rest of his life. [36], In December 1903, to avert another bout of Beebe's throat ailment, Hornaday sent him on an expedition to Mexico which would last until the following April. In recognition of the research conducted on his expeditions, he was granted honorary doctorates from Tufts and Colgate University. Meanwhile, Beebe began searching for a new tropical research station to replace Kartabo, which had fallen victim to deforestation just like Kalacoon before it. [31][40] Beebe's first book, titled Two Bird Lovers in Mexico, was an account of this expedition. He was born on February 26, 1926 to Gerald and Nora (Curtice) Beebe in Fremont, Michigan. She was born on November 26, 1937, in Plainfield, NJ, the daughter of the late William H. Vermilye and Ruth Anderson Vermilye. While the text was written by Beebe, the illustrations were provided by several artists: Robert Bruce Horsfall, who had accompanied Beebe on the expedition, painted the environmental scenes for the illustrations' backgrounds, while the pheasants themselves were painted by other artists including George Edward Lodge, Charles R. Knight, and Louis Agassiz Fuertes. In addition to the open nature of their marriage, Elswyth described in a 1940s interview with Today's Woman magazine that she enjoyed the knowledge that Beebe was attractive to women. Other biologists who visited to conduct studies there and exchange ideas with Beebe included myrmecologist Ted Schneirla, ethologist Konrad Lorenz, entomologist Lincoln Brower, ethologist Donald Griffin, and ornithologist David Snow. For this gift, he was made a life member of the New York Zoological Society. Arrangements entrusted to Regina Funeral Home (306) 789-8850. As birds collect about the luxuriant growths of a garden in the upper air, so hosts of fish will follow your labors, great crabs and starfish will creep thither, and now and then fairy jellyfish will throb past, superior in beauty to anything in the upper world, more delicate and graceful than any butterfly. He was 73. [80], His expedition was completed after a total of 17 months, Beebe and Blair crossed the Pacific to San Francisco, then crossed the United States to return to their home in New York. Remembering the early studies of his own childhood, in which he had brought specimens to the American Museum of Natural History, he was happily working with them. [234] Beebe also began to be afflicted with a throat ailment which may have been Sjgren's syndrome, although lacking a complete understanding of what caused it, Beebe and his doctors referred to it as "mango mouth". His religion was largely the result of seeking to combine his sense of awe and wonder at the natural world with a scientific understanding of its workings. This study yielded a collection of 3,776 fish of 136 species, many of them also new to science. A Memorial Mass will be held on Saturday at 10 a.m. at St. He graduated from Fremont High School in 1947, after returning from an enlistment with the U.S. Navy. [51] The following year Beebe received a promotion from the Zoological Society, placing him on equal footing with the research scientists at the Museum of Natural History. [114][263] This was particularly significant in the area of conservation, of which he was one of the most important early advocates. [101] During a second trip to Kalacoon while his wrist healed, Beebe was further devastated to discover that due to wartime demand for rubber, the entire jungle surrounding the house had been clear-cut to make room for rubber trees. [282], Now under the management of the Asa Wright Nature Center, the William Beebe Tropical Research Station has gradually been renovated. He was born in Chester, PA and attended Penncrest High School. [126], In 1924, Beebe went on another expedition to his Guiana research station of Kartabo, intending to continue the detailed documentation of the tropical ecosystem that he had begun at Kalacoon. [245] Although he was not physically handsome in the traditional sense, he tended to dominate every social and professional situation due to his enthusiasm, intelligence, and charisma. [213] He was by this point the only remaining member of the zoo's original staff,[214] and had produced more scholarly papers and publicity than any other employee. [166] Barton had the good fortune that years earlier, Theodore Roosevelt had proposed a similar idea to Beebe, and Beebe approved of Barton's design. [218] Although the initial purchase of Simla had contained only the house and 22 acres (0.089km2) of the forest surrounding it, Beebe soon realized that this was insufficient for the research he wished to conduct, and purchased another neighboring estate known as St. Pat's which contained an additional 170 acres (0.69km2). We are sad to announce that on November 26, 2021, at the age of 79, John William Coulter of Beebe, Arkansas passed away. No, I don't want any bored men around me. [210] Finally, when the 1948 Venezuelan coup d'tat installed Marcos Prez Jimnez as Venezuela's dictator, Beebe decided that he could no longer continue to work in Venezuela. All a man has to do is see. He had a total of 64 animals named after him, and he described one new species of bird and 87 species of fish (see Category:Taxa named by William Beebe). Searching for a way to satisfy his expedition's donors, Beebe hit upon the idea of documenting the marine life of the Hudson Gorge just beyond the shore of New York City. [] One of the few things in the world of which I am really proud is that I know Will Beebe. [1][225] Beebe's last major expedition occurred in 1955, retracing the route he had taken during his pheasant expedition 45 years earlier, with the intention of discovering how the populations he had previously studied were faring in response to human encroachment. [151] He later went so far as to suggest that beachfront homes would someday contain their own underwater gardens, to be experienced with the help of diving helmets: If you wish to make a garden, choose some beautiful slope or reef grotto and with a hatchet chop and pry off coral boulders with waving purple sea-plumes and golden sea-fans and great particolored anemones. View Source Share Save to Suggest Edits Memorial Photos Flowers Memorials Region North America USA Oklahoma This promotion explicitly granted him two months off each year, for further research expeditions. [72], Finished in Java, Beebe and his crew sailed north from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur to begin exploring Malaya. [212], In January 1950, the New York Zoological Society celebrated to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Beebe's work for them. [120] Passing through the Sargasso Sea on the way to the Galpagos, Beebe was fascinated by the diversity of life that could be found in the sargassum weed floating on the surface and spent several days scooping the weed from the water to examine the creatures that lived in it. It is with deep sorrow that we announce the death of Connie McAfee of Beebe, Arkansas, born in Brinkley, Arkansas, who passed away on February 22, 2023, at the age of 61, leaving to mourn family and friends. Service for William D. "Bill" Beebe, age 76, of Enid is Friday, September 11, 2020 at 10:00 am at Ladusau-Evans Funeral Home. [261] Carson dedicated her 1951 book The Sea Around Us to Beebe, writing "My absorption in the mystery and meaning of the sea have been stimulated and the writing of this book aided by the friendship and encouragement of William Beebe. [176] Although Beebe and Barton performed no dives in 1933, their work gathered a large amount of publicity when the Bathysphere was displayed in a special exhibit for the American Museum of Natural History, and later at the Century of Progress World's Fair in Chicago, where they shared the fair's Hall of Science with Auguste Piccard. [197] Transportation to and from Bermuda resumed in 1940, and Beebe returned there in May 1941, but the environment was slowly being transformed due to the war. To some men, the jungle is a tangled place of heat and danger. The product of Jocelyn Crane's search for a potential research station in Trinidad and Tobago was a house on a hill overlooking the Arima Valley, which was known as Verdant Vale. Family and friends are welcome to leave their condolences on this memorial page and share them with the family. [37] Since Mexico was still largely unstable at this point, he and Blair traveled on horseback and lived mostly in tents, and both carried revolvers for self-protection. Marguerite. Anchoring in a small cove, Beebe and his assistant John Tee-Van searched for an active crater where they could observe the eruption and were nearing exhaustion by the time they found one. [194] Like Hollister before her, Crane would eventually become Beebe's lover during the long expeditions that Beebe made without Elswyth's companionship. [146], In 1927, Beebe went on an expedition to Haiti to document its marine life. His terrace there was decorated with statues of characters from Winnie-the-Pooh that had been a gift from A. This expedition was Beebe's introduction to the tropics, with which he developed a long-standing fascination. The dangers of environmental destruction, Beebe helped to raise public awareness about topic. A Memorial Mass will be held on Saturday at 10 a.m. at.. 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