Abstract
Henry Hurd Rusby (1855–1940) is one of the outstanding personalities in the history of the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG). He played a significant role, not only in the founding of NYBG in 1891, but also in establishing a strong precedent of research and exploration in the field of economic botany at the new institution. As a result of Rusby’s influence and activity, the study of useful plants formed an important part of NYBG’s original mandate, an institutional commitment that was rejuvenated nearly a century later, with the formation of the Institute of Economic Botany. An indefatigable researcher both in the field and in the herbarium, Rusby left behind a voluminous corpus of published work in systematic and economic botany that is a legacy for modern botanists and pharmacologists.
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Williams, D.E., Fraser, S.M. Henry Hurd Rusby: The father of economic botany at the New York Botanical Garden. Brittonia 44, 273–279 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02957813
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02957813