Jordan, David Starr, 1851–1931, American scientist and educator, b. Gainesville, N.Y., M.S. Cornell, 1872, M.D. Indiana Medical College, 1875, and studied under Louis Agassiz at Penikese Island. He taught (1875–79) at Butler Univ. and in 1879 became professor of zoology and head of the department of natural science at Indiana Univ.; there he was president from 1885 to 1891. He served as the first president (1891–1913) of Stanford Univ. and as chancellor (1913–16). A prolific writer and a popular speaker, he was active as director (1910–14) of the World Peace Foundation and president (1915) of the World Peace Congress. Peace and international arbitration were the subjects of his books The Human Harvest (1907) and War and Waste (1913). As a leading ichthyologist, Jordan served on international commissions for fisheries and as assistant (1877–91, 1894–1909) to the U.S. Fish Commission. His earliest important work, A Manual of the Vertebrate Animals of Northern United States (1876), went through many editions. He also wrote The Fishes of North and Middle America (4 vol., 1896–1900), A Guide to the Study of Fishes (2 vol., 1905), Your Family Tree (with S. L. Kimball, 1929), and Trend of the American University (1929).

Bibliography

See his autobiographical Days of a Man (2 vol., 1922); biography by H. A. Moran (1969).

Jordan, David Starr

(born Jan. 19, 1851, near Gainesville, N.Y., U.S.—died Sept. 19, 1931, Stanford, Calif.) U.S. educator and ichthyologist. He studied at Cornell University and taught at universities in Indiana until 1885, when he became president of Indiana University. In 1891 he became the first president of Stanford University, and served until 1913. His extensive field trips led to his naming 1,085 genera and more than 2,500 species of fishes. He was coauthor (with B.W. Evermann) of The Fishes of North and Middle America (1896–1900) and author of Manual of the Vertebrates of the Northern United States (13 editions, 1876–1929). He devoted his later career mainly to the cause of international peace, acting as chief director of the World Peace Foundation.

Jordan, David Starr (1851–1931) biologist, educator; born near Gainesville, N.Y. He was (1891–1913) the first president of Stanford University, and as a prominent advocate of world federalism and peace, was president of the World Peace Congress (1915). He formulated "Jordan's Law" on the geographical distribution of species and published widely on biology, education, and peace.