Benjamin Matlack Everhart

Benjamin Matlack Everhart (born near West Chester, Pennsylvania, 24 April 1818; died in West Chester, 22 September 1904) was a United States mycologist.

His father, William Everhart, the son of a Revolutionary soldier, was a merchant, and a member of congress in 1853-55. Benjamin was educated in private schools in West Chester, and spent his early life in mercantile business there and in Charleston, South Carolina, making a comfortable fortune.

From boyhood, he was an ardent student of botany, and after retiring from business in 1867 he devoted himself almost entirely to that science, particularly to cryptogamic botany. In connection with J. B. Ellis, of New Jersey, he was active in issuing yearly fifty volumes, called The Century of North American Fungi, each volume describing 100 species. At the same time, with William A. Kellerman, of Kansas, they published the Journal of Mycology.

He discovered many new fungi. The genus Everhartia was named for him, as well as the following species:

His brother James Bowen Everhart was a member of congress.

Attribution

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