Charles Chilton (zoologist)

Charles Chilton (27 September 1860 – 25 October 1929) was a New Zealand zoologist, the first rector to be appointed in Australasia, and the first person to be awarded a D.Sc. degree in New Zealand.

Chilton was born on 27 September 1860 at Little Marstone, Pencombe (near Leominster, Herefordshire, England) but emigrated with his family to New Zealand in 1862. They settled on a farm at East Eyreton, North Canterbury. He was troubled by his hips from an early age, and had his left leg amputated, using an artificial leg and a crutch thereafter.

He entered Canterbury College in 1875 as an unmatriculated student, and matriculated three years later. In 1881, he gained a Master of Art with first class honours, having been taught by Frederick Wollaston Hutton, who inspired him to take up biology, especially the study of crustaceans, which had been little studied in New Zealand up to that time. Chilton's first scientific publication followed that same year, when he described three new species of crustacean (two crabs and one isopod) from Lyttelton Harbour and Lake Pupuke. He surprised the scientific world later that year by describing four species of amphipod and isopod from groundwaters at the family farm in Eyreton. He went on to discover the isopod Phreatoicus typicus in the same location, the first example ever described of the suborder Phreatoicidea, the "earliest derived isopod[s]".

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