Why is Darwin more famous than Wallace in the explanation of evolution?

Answer 1

The reason the focus, or major credit goes to Darwin is, though they both realized the principles of evolution, Wallace's presentation was little more than the realization. Darwin had had the realization and spent almost twenty years documenting and exploring the relations and complexities of said theory. Wallace himself had no difficulty with Darwin receiving the majority of the credit. Wallace had sent Darwin his paper on the topic, which kind of shocked Darwin that some one else might scoop his idea, he decided to present his idea to the Royal Society, and when he did so, he presented at the same time Wallace's paper, a very gracious thing to do on Darwins part. Wallace was at the time totally unaware of what was happening and only learned after the fact that he was presented to the Royal Society as co-discoverer of, The Theory Of Evolution By Natural Selection.

Answer 2

Darwin and Wallace both had similar theories and Wallace should have been recognized. However, Darwin's friends urged him to get his findings out before Wallace so that Darwin could get the fame. Darwin succeeding in doing this and Wallace couldn't explain his theories because it would seem as though he stole Darwin's work.