Jason Richard Swallen (May 1, 1903 -April 22, 1991) was an American

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 ...

specializing in grasses.Jason Swallen
/ref> Born in

Alliance, Ohio Alliance is a city in Stark County, Ohio, United States. The population was 21,672 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It was established in 1854 by the merger of three smaller communities and was a manufacturing and railroad hub in t ...

, Swallen graduated from

Ohio Wesleyan University Ohio Wesleyan University (abbrevriated OWU) is a private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Delaware, Ohio, United States. It was founded in 1842 by Methodist leaders and Ohio Valley, Centra ...

(AB 1924) and Kansas State Agricultural College (MS 1925). He spent two summers at the Michigan University Biological Station, then in 1925, he started as a botanist at the

US Department of Agriculture The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is an executive department of the United States federal government that aims to meet the needs of commercial farming and livestock food production, promotes agricultural trade and producti ...

, serving under the USDA's chief agrostologist A. S. Hitchcock and after Hitchcock's sudden death in 1935, Agnes Chase. Swallen practiced botany in California in 1927, and from the southwest United States to Yucatan, Mexico, in 1928, 1931 and 1932. In 1936, he published on the grasses of Honduras and Peten, Guatemala, and was promoted to associate botanist. From 1943 to 1945, he served in Brazil as agricultural production officer in the US

Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs The Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs, later known as the Office for Inter-American Affairs, was a United States agency promoting inter-American cooperation (Pan-Americanism) during the 1940s, especially in commercial and econ ...

. In 1947, he became the curator of the Division of Grasses at the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...

and chaired the Botany Department from 1950 until his retirement in 1965. In retirement he lived in Florida, Maryland, and Ohio. In 1954 he was awarded an honorary DSc degree by Ohio Wesleyan University. With Leona Winifred Smith, whom he married on June 10, 1929, he had one daughter, Ester. He was married a second time, to Clara Bayne Brasel, a 1941 Graduate of George Washington University and a Secretary at the Smithsonian, on August 28, 1955. The genus '' Swallenia'' for Eureka Valley dune grass, endemic to

Inyo County, California Inyo County () is a County (United States), county in the Eastern California, eastern central part of the U.S. state of California, located between the Sierra Nevada and the state of Nevada. In the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the po ...

, commemorates his name.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Swallen, Jason Richard Agrostologists 1903 births 1991 deaths American taxonomists Botanists active in California Botanists active in Central America United States Department of Agriculture people Smithsonian Institution people 20th-century American botanists