John Torrey (August 15, 1796 – March 10, 1873) was an American
botanist.
Torrey was born in New York. When he was 15 or 16 years of age his father received a prison
appointment at Greenwich, and there he made the acquaintance of Amos Eaton, a pioneer of
natural history studies in America. He thus learned the elements of botany, as well as
something of mineralogy and chemistry. In 1815 he began the study of medicine, qualifying in 1818. In the following year he issued his Catalogue of Plants growing spontaneously within Thirty Miles of the
City of New York, and in 1824 he issued the first and only volume of his Flora of the
Northern and Middle States. In the same year he obtained the chair of chemistry and geology
at West Point military academy, and three years later the professorship
of chemistry and botany in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York.
In 1836 he was appointed botanist to the state of New York and produced his Flora of that state
in 1843; while from 1838 to 1843 he carried on the publication of the
earlier portions of Flora of North America, with the assistance of his pupil, Asa Gray.
From 1853 he was chief assayer to the United States assay office, but he continued to take an
interest in botanical teaching until his death.
Torrey made over his valuable herbarium and botanical library to Columbia College in 1860, and he was the first
president of the Torrey Botanical Club in 1873. His name is commemorated in the small
coniferous genus Torreya, found in North America,
China and Japan. T. taxifolia, a native of Florida, is known as the Florida torreya, Torrey nutmeg, or stinking-cedar; and also in the Torrey pine, Pinus torreyana from southern California. He also first described the carnivorous plant genus Darlingtonia, which he named after a friend.
References
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