On September 26, 1924, the ground collapsed beneath a truck in a
back alley in Washington, D.C., revealing a mysterious underground
labyrinth. In spite of wild speculations, the tunnel was not the
work of German spies, but rather an aging, eccentric Smithsonian
scientist named Harrison Gray Dyar, Jr. While Dyar's covert
tunneling habits may seem far-fetched, they were merely one of many
oddities in Dyar's unbelievable life. For the first time, insect
biosystemist Marc E. Epstein presents a complete account of Dyar's
life story. Dyar, one of the most influential biologists of the
twentieth century, focused his entomological career on building
natural classifications of various groups of insects. His
revolutionary approach to taxonomy, which examined both larval and
adult stages of insects, brought about major changes in the
scientific community's understanding of natural relationships and
insect systematics. He was also the father of what came to be known
as Dyar's Law, a pragmatic method to standardize information on
insect larval stages as they grow. Over the course of his
illustrious career at the U.S. National Museum, Smithsonian
Institution from 1897-1929, Dyar named over 3,000 species,
established the "List of North American Lepidoptera," an unrivaled
catalog of moths and butterflies, and built one of the nation's
premier lepidoptera and mosquito collections. However, Dyar's
scientific accomplishments are a mere component of this remarkable
biography. Epstein offers an account of Dyar's complicated personal
life, from his feuds with fellow entomologists to the scandalous
revelation that he was married to two wives at the same time.
Epstein also chronicles Dyar's exploration of the Baha'i faith, his
extensive travels, his innumerable works of unpublished fiction,
and the loss of his wealth from bad investments. Comprehensive and
engaging, Moths, Myths, and Mosquitoes will delight entomologists
and historians alike, as well as anyone interested in exploring the
zany life of one of America's virtually unknown scientific
geniuses.
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