Dirk Albert Hooijer (30 May 1919 – 26 November 1993) was a Dutch paleontologist. Hooijer was born in

Medan Medan ( , ) is the capital city, capital and largest city of the Indonesian Provinces of Indonesia, province of North Sumatra. The nearby Strait of Malacca, Port of Belawan, and Kualanamu International Airport make Medan a regional hub and multi ...

Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of islands by area, sixth-largest island in the world at 482,286.55 km2 (182,812 mi. ...

, but spent his youth in

Bogor Bogor City (), or Bogor (, ), is a landlocked city in the West Java, Indonesia. Located around south of the national capital of Jakarta, Bogor is the 6th largest city in the Jakarta metropolitan area and the 14th overall nationwide.

Java Java is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea (a part of Pacific Ocean) to the north. With a population of 156.9 million people (including Madura) in mid 2024, proje ...

. In 1932, his family moved to

The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

where he finished his high school education at Dalton Den Haag school in 1937. Subsequently, he studied geology on the

University of Leiden Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; ) is a public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. Established in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange as a Protestant institution, it holds the distinction of being the oldest university in the Neth ...

. In 1941 he joined the staff of the

Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie The Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie (National Museum of Natural History) was a museum on the Rapenburg in Leiden, the Netherlands. It was founded in 1820 by Royal Decree from a merger of several existing collections including Temminck's own ...

in Leiden, where he was especially interested in fossil

rhinoceros A rhinoceros ( ; ; ; : rhinoceros or rhinoceroses), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant taxon, extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates (perissodactyls) in the family (biology), famil ...

es and

hippopotami The hippopotamus (''Hippopotamus amphibius;'' ; : hippopotamuses), often shortened to hippo (: hippos), further qualified as the common hippopotamus, Nile hippopotamus and river hippopotamus, is a large semiaquatic mammal native to sub-Sahara ...

. In 1946, he became curator of the Dubois collection. In the same year he promoted under Professor

Hilbrand Boschma Hilbrand Boschma (22 April 1893 – 22 July 1976) was a Dutch zoologist and director of the Rijksmuseum of Natural History in Leiden. Boschma studied botany and zoology at the University of Amsterdam. He went to the former Dutch East Indies, w ...

(1893–1976) with his dissertation ''Prehistoric and fossil Rhinoceroses from the Malay Archipelago and India''. From 1950 to 1951 he got a

Rockefeller fellowship The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The foundation was created by Standard Oil magnate John D. Rockefeller ("Seni ...

and worked at the

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. Located in Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 21 interconn ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. From 1970 until his retirement in 1979 he was professor at the

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Irvine, California, United States. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, U ...

. Hooijer published 267 scientific articles about vertebrate fossils from Indonesia, Africa, the

Near East The Near East () is a transcontinental region around the Eastern Mediterranean encompassing the historical Fertile Crescent, the Levant, Anatolia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and coastal areas of the Arabian Peninsula. The term was invented in the 20th ...

(especially Israel), the Netherlands, the Antilles, and South America. Many of these works were devoted to fossil rhinoceroses, cats, hogs, rodents, primates, and probiscoidae. He described six new genera, including ''

Celebochoerus ''Celebochoerus'' is an extinct genus of giant suid artiodactyl that existed during the Pliocene and Pleistocene in Sulawesi, Indonesia (''Celebochoerus heekereni''), and the middle Pleistocene of Luzon, in the Philippines (''Celebochoerus cagay ...

'', '' Chilotheridium'', '' Epileptobos'', '' Paradiceros'', '' Paulocnus'', and '' Spelaeomys'' and 47 new species and subspecies, including '' Babyrousa bolabatuensis'', '' Elephas celebensis'' and the Flores Cave Rat. Hooijer was married and had two daughters and one son. He died in

Leiden Leiden ( ; ; in English language, English and Archaism, archaic Dutch language, Dutch also Leyden) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Nethe ...

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

References

* L. B. Holthuis: ''1820 - 1958 Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie'' C.h.j.m. Fransen, C. van Achterberg, P.j. van Helsdingen (editors) Nationaal Natuurhistorisch Museum 1995
PDF online
(in Dutch)

External links

1919 births 1993 deaths Dutch paleontologists Dutch curators People from Medan Dutch expatriates in the United States {{netherlands-scientist-stub