Bashford Dean papers

Bashford Dean (1867-1928) was a teacher, ichthyologist, and armor scholar. As curator, he headed emergent departments at the American Museum of Natural History (Reptiles and Fishes, 1903-1910) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (curator, Arms and Armor, 1904-1912) in New York City. In 1890 Dean received his doctorate degree in zoology and paleontology from Columbia University. A lifelong resident of New York City, he married Alice Dyckman, also of New York City, in 1893. He became Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in 1910 for work on French naturalist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. The National Academy of Sciences awarded Dean the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal in 1923 for his Bibliography of Fishes (1). Dean participated in the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, becoming its first president in 1916, and other associations (2). He served in the Bureau of Ordnance, U.S. Army, in World War One (1917-???). Dean died on December 6, 1928, in Michigan.

His career at the Museum began in 1897 (Osborn, 102). It culminated with his Bibliography, published 1916-1923, and the Hall of Fishes (later called the Hall of Ocean Life), which opened in 1928. Among the cultures and regions Dean examined were Japan, including the Ainu (1901, 1917), and American rivers (3)

He tutored at the College of the City of New York (1886-1991), an alma mater, and worked briefly for the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries (1889-1890??). In 1891, he started a lengthy career in teaching at Columbia University, another alma mater. (It named him assistant professor of zoology in 1896, professor of vertebrate zoology in 1904, honorary professor in 1927.) In 1925, Dean became professor of fine arts at New York University.