The Doctrine of Evolution: Its Basis and Its Scope

Henry Edward Crampton

Henry Edward Crampton was an American evolutionary biologist and malacologist who specialized in land snails. Crampton undertook the first major study of evolution in nature in his research in the Society Islands. Crampton made twelve separate expeditions over the course of his career to Moorea near Tahiti to study the land snail genus Partula, while years more were spent measuring and cataloguing his specimens. In all, he dedicated nearly half-a-century to the study. Crampton taught as a professor at Columbia University and Barnard College from 1904 to 1943. He also worked as a curator at the American Museum of Natural History.