A century of science in America : $b with special reference to the American Journal of Science, 1818-1918
History
A century of science in America : $b with special reference to the American Journal of Science, 1818-1918
American journal of science; Science -- United States -- History
The SECOND SERIES of the Journal, as already stated, began with January,
1846. Up to this time the publication had been a quarterly or two
volumes annually of two numbers each. From 1846 until the completion of
an additional fifty volumes in 1871, the Journal was made a bimonthly,
each of the two yearly volumes having three numbers each. Furthermore, a
general index was given for each period of five years, that is for every
ten volumes.
[Illustration: Edward S. Dana]
Much more important than this change was the addition to the editorial
staff of James Dwight Dana, Silliman’s son-in-law. Dana returned from
the four-years cruise of the Wilkes Exploring Expedition in 1842; he
settled in New Haven, was married in 1844, and in 1850 was appointed
Silliman professor of Geology in Yale College. He was at this time
actively engaged in writing his three quarto reports for the Expedition
and hence did not begin his active professional duties in Yale College
until 1856. Part of his inaugural address was quoted on an earlier page.
Dana had already performed the severe labor of preparing the complete
index to the First Series, a volume of about 350 pages, finally issued
in 1847. From the beginning of the Second Series he was closely
associated with his brother-in-law, the younger Silliman. Later the
editorial labor devolved more and more upon him and the larger part of
this he carried until about 1890. His work, was, however, somewhat
interrupted during periods of ill health. This was conspicuously true
during a year’s absence in Europe in 1859–60, made necessary in the
search for health; during these periods the editorial responsibility
rested entirely upon the younger Silliman. Of Dana’s contributions to
science in general this is not the place to speak, nor is the present
writer the one to dwell in detail upon his work for the Journal. This
subject is to such an extent involved in the history of geology and
zoology, the subjects of several succeeding chapters, that it is
adequately presented in them.
It may, however, be worth stating that in the bibliography accompanying
the obituary notice of Dana (=49=, 329–356, 1895) some 250 titles of
articles in the Journal are enumerated; these aggregate approximately
2800 pages. The number of critical notes, abstracts, book reviews, etc.,
could be also given, were it worth while, but what is much more
significant in this connection, than their number or aggregate length,
is the fact that these notices are in a large number of cases—like those
of Gray in botany—minutely critical and original in matter. They thus
give the writer’s own opinion on a multitude of different subjects. It
was a great benefit to Dana, as it was to science also, that he had this
prompt means at hand of putting before the public the results of his
active brain, which continued to work unceasingly even in times of
health prostration.
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