Athena Review Image Archive ™
Louis Agassiz (1807-1873)
Louis Agassiz (photo ca. 1865).
Louis Agassiz, shown in this photo at about age 58, was a pioneer researcher and geologist. His five volumes of Recherches sur les poissons fossiles ("Research on Fossil Fish"), which appeared at intervals from 1833 to 1843, is a major landmark in paleontology. Originally from Switzerland, Agassiz taught first in Germany, and later for many years at Harvard and Cornell Universities in the US.
Based on his geologic studies of glaciers in Switzerland, in 1837 Agassiz was the first to scientifically propose that the Earth had been subject to a past ice age. Some of his early fossil studies in the late 1820s and 1830s were based on collections from the Amazon region of Brazil. Others included findings in the Early Jurassic formations in southern England such as the Blue Lias formation, where he worked with Mary Anning at Lyme Regis, discovering fossil taxa such as the shark Acrodus.
Reference:
Agassiz, Louis 1833-1843. Recherches sur les poissons fossiles.
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