Leo Lesquereux

Charles Léo Lesquereux (November 18, 1806 - October 25, 1889) was a Swiss bryologist and a pioneer of American paleobotany. He was born in the town of Fleurier, located in the canton of Neuchâtel.

Due to a childhood accident, Lesquereux suffered from progressive hearing loss that eventually led to total deafness. Despite the fact he lacked formal training in botany, he became a celebrated figure in the field of paleobotany. Until 1827 he took classes at the academy at Neuchâtel, and subsequently worked as a tutor of French language in Eisenach. Afterwards he returned to Switzerland as a schoolteacher, and later principal in the town of Locle. Within three years his hearing had deteriorated to the point he had to give up his teaching job.

As a young man he took many excursions collecting rare mosses in the Jura Mountains, which eventually led to investigations of peat bogs. His pioneer research and analysis regarding the origin, compositionand development of peat resulted in a close friendship with famed scientist Louis Agassiz (1807-1873). Soon afterwards, Lesquereux was commissioned by the Prussian government to perform scientific studies of peat bogs throughout Europe.

In 1847 Lesquereux followed Agassiz to the United States, where he performed bryological research with William Starling Sullivant (1803-1873) in Columbus, Ohio. With Sullivant, he published two editions of a treatise called "Musci Exsiccati Americani" (1856, 1865). Another important work on American bryology by Lesquereux was the two volume "Icones Muscorum" (1864), which was a summary of mosses found in the eastern United States.

Based on his past studies of European peat bogs, Lesquereux developed theories concerning the origin of coal formations. As a consultant for state geological surveys in several U.S. states, he performed pioneer investigations of Paleozoic flora. From these paleobotanical studies, his best work was a study of carboniferous flora of Pennsylvania titled "Description of the Coal Flora of the Carboniferous Formation in Pennsylvania and the United States" (1879-84), which was a three-volume publication that became the standard for U.S. carboniferous flora.

The plant genus "Lesquerella" from the family Brassicaceae is named in his honor. Lesquereux died at the age of 82 on October 25, 1889 in Columbus.

References

* [http://www.amphilsoc.org/library/mole/l/lesquereux.htm American Philosophical Society, Biography]
* [http://www.emporia.edu/earthsci/student/schmidt4/lesq.html History of Geology by A. Schmidt, Biography]