# Adolph D. E. Elmer

Adolph Daniel Edward Elmer (June 14, 1870 – 1942) was an American botanist and plant collector. He was mostly active in the Philippines, his collections being described as new species by both himself and other botanists. The Japanese sent him into Santo Tomas Internment Camp during the Philippines campaign and he died there.

## Life and achievements

Elmer was born on June 14, 1870 in Van Dyne, Wisconsin, United States, to Jacob Van Dyne and Alvina Elmer. He was educated at Washington State College in 1899, married Emma Osterman in 1902 and earned an A.M. from Stanford University in 1903 (or 1904).
Between 1896 and the year of the earning of his A.M., he collected numerous plants in Western United States (especially California) then began describing new plant species, his name appearing in earlier numbers of Botanical Gazette [de] (e.g. Festuca idahoensis in 1903).
In 1904, he went to the Philippines (an unincorporated territory of the United States at that time), where he consequently made his home through the life. He made extensive plant collections in the Philippines from 1904 to 1927, and also in Borneo. According to Albert William Christian Theodore Herre, Elmer Drew Merrill regarded Adolph Daniel Edward Elmer as the best plant collector working in the Philippines and Southwestern Asia until the beginning of WWII. Merrill gave such reputation with a proof, i.e. Merrill (1929). He was editor of Leaflets of Philippine Botany [species], where he published more than 1,500 new taxa.

## Death

Elmer and his wife, Emma Osterman Elmer, had once planned to leave American-controlled Manila and return to their homeland shortly before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor occurred.
The Japanese invasion succeeded it in no time and involved the couple, as well.
Adolph Elmer died on either April 17, 1942 or in July 1942, in the Santo Tomas Internment Camp in the Manila, Philippines, of natural causes. His private type collection, held in the Philippine National Herbarium, was destroyed about that time. Emma Osterman Elmer survived internment.

## Legacy

Many taxa are named in honor of Elmer, including Zeuxine elmeri [species] (Ames) Ames (syn. Adenostylis elmeri Ames), Begonia elmeri [species] Merr. (syn. B. peltata Elmer, nom. illeg.), Castilleja elmeri Fernald, Cynometra elmeri [species] Merr. (note that at least all of these four examples are based on Elmer's type specimens), and so on.
The genera Adelmeria (Zingiberaceae), Elmera (Saxifragaceae), Elmerinula (Dothideomycetes), and Elmerobryum (Hypnaceae) are also named after him.

## Explanatory notes

* ↑ His name also appears in a list of plant collectors of the Kew Herbarium specimens published in 1901, as one who conducted activity in Washington Territory.

## Citations

* 1 2 3 4 5 van Steenis-Kruseman (1950).
* 1 2 3 Copeland (1949:1).
* 1 2 3 4 Herre (1945).
* 1 2 3 4 5 6 Thomas (1961).
* 1 2 3 Natural History Museum (BM). "Elmer, Adolph Daniel Edward (1870-1942) on JSTOR". Retrieved May 21, 2021.
* ↑ "A list of the collectors whose plants are in the herbarium of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, to 31st December, 1899". Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information. 1901: 21. 1901.
* ↑ Elmer, A. D. E. (1903). "New Western plants. I". Botanical Gazette. 36: 53. doi:10.1086/328375. S2CID 84253482.
* 1 2 "Arlington News". The Enterprise. Vol. 48, no. 2. January 13, 1944. p. 7. Retrieved May 19, 2021. Word was received indirectly through other relatives, that Mrs. Emma Osterman Elmer, at one time a resident of Arlington, is alive and seemingly well in the Philippines. It has been over a year since last hearing from her, and it was feared she was dead. Mrs. Elmer and her husband, a professor in the University of the Philippines for many years, planning to return shortly before Pearl Harbor. Later, Professor Elmer died in a concentration camp, and since that, no word had been received. Mrs. Elmer wrote that she was living in an apartment, but was under close watch at all times, she had good food and kind treatment.
* ↑ Ames, Oakes (1912). "Orchidaceae novae et criticae Insularum Philippinarum". Leaflets of Philippine Botany. 5: 1552.
* ↑ Elmer, A. D. E. (1915). "Two Hundred Twenty Six New Species―I". Leaflets of Philippine Botany. 7: 2556f.
* ↑ Merrill, E. D. (1918). "New or noteworthy Philippine plants, XIII". The Philippine Journal of Science: Section C. Botany. 13 (1): 39.
* ↑ Fernald, M. L. (1898). "Notes upon Some Northwestern Castilleias of the Parviflora Group". Erythea: A Journal of Botany, West American and General. 6: 51.
* ↑ Merrill (1929:98).
* ↑ Burkhardt, Lotte (2018). Verzeichnis eponymischer Pflanzennamen – Erweiterte Edition [Index of Eponymic Plant Names – Extended Edition] (pdf) (in German). Berlin: Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum, Freie Universität Berlin. doi:10.3372/epolist2018. ISBN 978-3-946292-26-5. S2CID 187926901. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
* ↑ Quattrocchi, Umberto (2000). CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names, Volume II, D–L. Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press. ISBN 978-0-8493-2676-9.
* ↑ International Plant Names Index. Elmer.

## General bibliography

* Merrill, E. D. (1929). "Plantae Elmerianae Borneenses". University of California Publications in Botany. 15: 1–316.
* Herre, Albert W.C.T. (1945). "Obituary: A.D.E. Elmer". Science. 101 (2628): 477–478. doi:10.1126/science.101.2628.477. PMID 17735519.
* Copeland, Edwin B. (1949). "A. D. E. Elmer: Leaflets of Philippine Botany". The Philippine Journal of Science. 78 (1): 1–4.
* van Steenis-Kruseman, M. J. (1950). "Elmer, Adolph Daniel Edward". Flora Malesiana. 1. 1: 151–152. - its supplemented version (ElmerADE) is available on the website of the National Herbarium of the Netherlands. Accessed: 21 May 2021.
* Thomas, John H. (1961). "The History of Botanical Collecting in the Santa Cruz Mountains of Central California" (PDF). Contributions from the Dudley Herbarium. 5 (6): 154.