Jump to Content

Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Wiggins (Ira L.) Papers
SC0177  
View entire collection guide What's This?
Search this collection
Collection Details
 
Table of contents What's This?
  • Common Abbreviations
  • RELATED COLLECTIONS
  • Scope and Content
  • Biography
  • Preferred Citation:
  • Provenance
  • Publication Rights
  • Access Restrictions

  • Language of Material: English
    Contributing Institution: Department of Special Collections and University Archives
    Title: Ira L. Wiggins Papers
    creator: Wiggins, Ira L. (Ira Loren)
    Identifier/Call Number: SC0177
    Physical Description: 8 Linear Feet
    Date (inclusive): 1926-1985
    Language of Material: English

    Common Abbreviations

    1. A.I.N.A.-Arctic Institute of North America
    2. A.S.P.T.-American Society of Plant Taxonomists
    3. A.I.B.S.-American Institute of Biological Sciences
    4. B.S.F.-Belvedere Scientific Fund

    RELATED COLLECTIONS

    SC0022 - Douglas H. Campbell Papers

    Scope and Content

    This collection covers the period 1928-65 and consists mainly of professional correspondence. Wiggins maintained long-term contact with a number of prominent botanists and participated in many professional exchanges of information and specimens, often dealing with the identification of certain flora. His field trips are described in great detail in this correspondence as well as in the various reports he wrote. There is a good amount of correspondence on his work with the Belvedere Scientific Fund in Baja California, and a fair amount of Stanford University correspondence relating to his administrative duties over the years. There are also files relating to Wiggins' duties with the American Fern Society and the Arctic Institute of North America. These files do not contain any of Prof. Wiggins' papers dealing with his research at Point Barrow, Alaska for the U.S. Government (Summer 1950- Sept. 1953 and Mar.-Oct. 1956). Field notebooks are also not included in the collection.
    Additional papers were received in 1983 and 1986, largely consisting of correspondence and articles, 1926 to 1985. Of note are papers relating to Wiggin's work in Ecuador, 1944; notes from field trips to the Sonoran desert, 1926-37; typescripts of several articles; and collected materials and drafts of biographies on A. W. C. T. Herre, Gilbert M. Smith, and Carl B. Wolf.
    Major correspondents include Wendell Holmes Camp and B.A. Krukoff (New York Botanical Garden), J.Pinckney Hester (Boyce Thompson Arboretum), Maximino Martinez (Sociedad Botanica de México), Wm. R. Maxon (U.S. National Museum), Reed C. Rollins (Gray Herbarium, Harvard and U.S. Bureau of Plant Industry), Forrest Shreve (Carnegie Institute Division of Plant Biology, Desert Investigations), William Steere (Department of Botany, University of Michigan and Editor, American Journal of Botany), Albert M.Vollmer, M.D. (accompanied Wiggins on field trips), William A. Weber (Univesity of Colorado), and Carol H. Woodward (New York Botanical Garden and editor for several of Wiggins' articles).
    Professor Wiggins grouped his correspondence alphabetically within certain time periods. Certain major correspondents have their own folders, but it is wise to check the general correspondence files as well. The accessions received in 1983 and 1986 were combined and processed as "additional papers." As far as possible original folder labels were retained; the folders were then arranged alphabetically. Where appropriate, correspondence from the general correspondence folders was removed and given separate folders.

    Biography

    Ira Loren Wiggins, Emeritus Professor of Biology, former Curator of the Dudley Herbarium and Director of the Natural History Museum, was born on January 1, 1899. He received his A.B. degree from Occidental College in 1922, his A.M. from Stanford in 1925, and His Ph.D. in botany from Stanford in 1930. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1929 and became Emeritus Professor of Biology in 1964.
    Professor Wiggins was active in a number of organizations in his field. He served as President of the American Fern Society, the California Botanical Society, the California Academy of Sciences, and the American Society of Plant Taxonomists. He was a member of the Board of Governors of the Arctic Society of America and Editor of the American Fern Journal. He served as Scientific Director of the Arctic Research Laboratory at Point Barrow, Alaska and conducted botanical field research in Baja California under the auspices of the Belvedere Scientific Fund. His publications include over 100 papers dealing with systematic botany and plant ecology. His book A Flora of the Alaskan Arctic Slope, written in conjunction with John Hunter Thomas, Asst. Curator of the Dudley Herbarium and lecturer in biology at Stanford, was published by the University of Toronto Press in 1962.

    Preferred Citation:

    [Identification of item], Ira L. Wiggins Papers, SC0177, Stanford University Archives, Stanford, Calif.

    Provenance

    Gift of Ira L. Wiggins

    Publication Rights

    Property rights reside with the repository. Literary rights reside with the creators of the documents or their heirs. To obtain permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the Public Services Librarian of the Dept. of Special Collections and University Archives.

    Access Restrictions

    The materials are open for research use.

    Subjects and Indexing Terms

    Baja California (Mexico : Peninsula)
    Zoology -- Arctic regions
    Botany -- Arctic regions.
    Biology -- Fieldwork.
    Wiggins, Ira L. (Ira Loren)
    Wiggins, Ira L. (Ira Loren)
    Camp, W. H. (Wendell Holmes)
    Stanford University. Natural History Museum
    Hester, J. Pinckney.
    Arctic Institute of North America.
    Stanford University. Department of Biology -- General subdivision--Faculty.;
    Maxon, William R. (William Ralph)
    Rollins, Reed C. (Reed Clark)
    Dudley Herbarium
    Krukoff, B. A.
    Martinez, Maximino.
    Vollmer, Albert M.
    Shreve, Forrest.
    Steere, William Campbell,
    Belvedere Scientific Fund.
    Woodward, Carol H.