Person
Masters, George (1837 - 1912)
- Born
- July 1837
Maidstone, Kent, England - Died
- 23 June 1912
Elizabeth Bay, New South Wales, Australia - Occupation
- Entomologist
Summary
George Masters was an entomologist and a prolific collector of natural history specimens of all kinds. In the course of his many collecting expeditions through Australia he developed an unrivalled knowledge of the life histories of Australian animals. By 1860 he was employed as a gardener at Thomas Shepherd's Darling Nursery in Sydney. In the early 1860s he was sent to Queensland by William Macleay to collect insects, an association that lasted for the rest of his life. For ten years from 1864 Masters was Assistant Curator and Collector at the Australian Museum where, despite an undertaking to the contrary, he continued to collect for himself and Macleay as well as the Museum. In 1874 Masters became curator of Macleay's own collection, and remained so after Macleay's death and the transfer of the collections to the University of Sydney. As Macleay's Curator, Masters participated in the 1875 Chevert Expedition to New Guinea led by Macleay. Masters' principal publications were Catalogue of the described diurnal Lepidoptera of Australia (1873), the first book entirely devoted to Australian butterflies, and Catalogue of the described Coleoptera of Australia (1871 - 1874)
Details
Chronology
- c. 1856
- Life event - Migrated to Australia
- 1864 - 1874
- Career position - Assistant Curator and Collector, Australian Museum, Sydney
- 1874 - 1912
- Career position - Curator of the Macleay family collections and the Macleay Museum
- 1875
- Career position - Zoological collector, Chevert Expedition
Related entries
Archival resources
The Linnean Society of New South Wales
- George Masters - Records, 1874 - 1912; The Linnean Society of New South Wales. Details
Published resources
Books
- Musgrave, A., Bibliography of Australian entomology, 1775-1930: with biographical notes on authors and collectors (Sydney: Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales, 1932), 380 pp. Details
Book Sections
- Whitley, G. P., 'Masters, George (1837-1912), entomologist' in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Douglas Pike, ed., vol. 5 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1974), pp. 223-224. http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A050253b.htm. Details
Journal Articles
- Fulton, Graham R., 'A detailed report on the birds collected on the Chevert Expedition to New Guinea, in 1875', Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales, 143 (2021), 9-36. https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/LIN/article/view/15518. Details
- Masters, G., 'Zoology of the Chevert - ornithology, part I', Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales, 1 (1) (1875), 44-64, https://openjournals.library.sydney.edu.au/LIN/issue/view/458. Details
- Whitley, G. P., 'George Masters, Naturalist', Australian Zoologist, 16 (2) (1971), 25-32. Details
Resources
- Wikidata, http://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q21538213. Details
- VIAF - Virtual International Authority File, OCLC, https://viaf.org/viaf/94410696. Details
- 'Masters, George (18361207-19120623)', Trove, National Library of Australia, 2009, https://nla.gov.au/nla.party-617198. Details
Gavan McCarthy [P004098] and Helen Cohn
Created: 20 October 1993, Last modified: 6 October 2023
- Foundation Supporter - Committee to Review Australian Studies in Tertiary Education