Cecil Ernest Claude Fischer (9 July 1874 – 19 October 1950) was a

botanist Botany, also called plant science, is the branch of natural science and biology studying plants, especially Plant anatomy, their anatomy, Plant taxonomy, taxonomy, and Plant ecology, ecology. A botanist or plant scientist is a scientist who s ...

born in

Bombay Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial centre, financial capital and the list of cities i ...

to European parents. He worked principally in the

Indian Forest Service The Indian Forest Service (IFS) is the premier forest service of India. .The IFS is one of the three All India Services along with the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) & the Indian Police Service (IPS). It was constituted in the year 1966 un ...

Life

Fischer was born in

, India on 9 July 1874. Prior to university training, he was educated in Switzerland and England. From 1892 to 1895 he attended the

Royal Indian Engineering College The Royal Indian Engineering College (or RIEC) was a British college of Civil Engineering run by the India Office to train civil engineers for service in the Indian Public Works Department. It was located on the Cooper's Hill estate, near Egham, ...

(also called Cooper's Hill College) where he studied forestry. His first professional posting in 1895 was in the

in the

Madras Presidency The Madras Presidency or Madras Province, officially called the Presidency of Fort St. George until 1937, was an administrative subdivision (province) of British India and later the Dominion of India. At its greatest extent, the presidency i ...

, a province of British India. In 1907 he served as an entomologist in

Dehradun Dehradun (), also known as Dehra Doon, is the winter capital and the List of cities in Uttarakhand by population, most populous city of the Indian state of Uttarakhand. It is the administrative headquarters of the eponymous Dehradun district, d ...

. From 1915 to 1917 he helped administrate the Madras Forest College (now called the

Tamil Nadu Forest Department The Tamil Nadu Forest Department, formerly the Madras Forest Department, is a Government of Tamil Nadu, government department responsible for managing all the Protected areas of Tamil Nadu, protected areas and forests plus Environmental polic ...

). From 1919-1920 he taught

silviculture Silviculture is the practice of controlling the growth, composition/structure, as well as quality of forests to meet values and needs, specifically timber production. The name comes from the Latin ('forest') and ('growing'). The study of forests ...

at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

. From 1920 to 1923 he served as a conservator of forests in Madras. He retired from the Indian Forest Service in 1926. From 1925 to 1940 he served as an assistant for India at the Herbarium of the

Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew is a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. An internationally important botanical research and education institution, it employs 1,10 ...

Legacy

He is the authority for at least 277

taxa In biology, a taxon (back-formation from ''taxonomy''; : taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit. Although neither is required, a taxon is usually known by a particular name and ...

including: The Fischer Herbarium at the Institute of Forest Genetics and Tree Breeding in

Coimbatore Coimbatore (Tamil: kōyamputtūr, ), also known as Kovai (), is one of the major Metropolitan cities of India, metropolitan cities in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyy ...

, Tamil Nadu is named in honor of Fischer.

References

1874 births 1950 deaths British botanists Alumni of the Royal Indian Engineering College British people in colonial India {{botanist-stub