FRANK RUSSELL, NOTED SCIENTIST

Submitted to USGenWeb Archives with permission from Francis Russell Nelson, 
typed by Linda Russell Lewis

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5.2 Russell Register p. 593

From: The Des Moines Register, November 15, 1903

Submitted by: Myrna R. Secor [address]


Iowa City, IA, Nov. 14 (Special). The death during the past week of Frank Russell,
the noted Iowa scientist, recalls many incidents connected with the life of this
very unusual man. The incidents of his career were of especial interest to Iowans
inasmuch as the was essentially an Iowan. He was raised upon an Iowa farm near Fort
Dodge and received the scientific training which made him famous, in the State University
of Iowa. His later work was done at Harvard, but this was after he had already become
famous through his envestigations. Mr. Russell was well known to all of the alumni
of the State university and was highly regarded by them as well as the members of
the faculty.

It is hardly possible that any man ever possessed more indomitable will-power and
perserverance than Mr. Russell. He was rarely known to fail in the accomplishment
of anything he undertook and he feared to undertake nothing. He faced the physical
and financial hardships at the same time. The latter he overcame, but the former
brought him to an early grave. He was but 36 years of age at the time of his death.

One incident which is told of Mr. Russell, concerning his early days in the State
University, illustrates his character. When he came here as a freshman he had less
than $10 to his name. There is a condition in the rules governing drill in the
university providing that students who cannot afford to buy uniforms are excused
from the drill. However, Russell did not take advantage of this provision, but insisted
upon drilling in his civilian clothes. He was thrown out of his company every time he
attempted to drill during his freshman year, because he did not appear in a uniform.
He was captain of the prize company the year he graduated.

Mr. Russell made every cent of his expenses during his college course by doing
crayon work. He earned more than twelve hundred dollars in this way during the 
four years. He, however, ofen declared that he was no artist. He just kept working
until the picture suited him.

Mr. Russell's first scientific expedition was made in the summer of 1891, in company
with Professors C. C. Nutting and A. G. Smith. They went into the northwestern
territory, Canada, collecting water birds for the university.

The next trip was of longer duration. He spent one summer in Utah and at Puget
Sound, and from there worked his way into Winnepeg. In 1893 he started north
from Winnipeg, collecting in the region of Lake Athalaska, on Slave river, at
Forts Resolution, Chippewayan Province and the surrounding country. From Fort
Rea in 1894, he went with the Indians upon their annual musk-ox hunt. It was
against the wishes of the red men, but he would not be prevented from this ex-
perience. He met with bitter hardships, but his expedition was successful.

From here he made the most remarkable trip of his life. He went north accompanied
by Count Sainville of Paris, in a one-man-canoe as far as Herschel Island in the
Artic ocean. From here he touched upon Siberia, and returned to San Francisco
in a whaler. All of this time he was collecting valuable material for the university
museum and his return to Iowa City was the signal for a great demonstration.

His patience was marvelous and beyond the appreciation of the average man. No task
was too great for him, as was illustrated by his labor to establish a theory he
held as to certain pranks and peculiarities of the formation of the bills of wild
geese. He visited the northern shooting grounds, killed thousands of birds himself
and measured thousands of others killed by market hunters. His measurements he
labored with almost painful labor and care, and then he worked out his theory.

mr. Russell entered Harvard in 1895, and after receiving his master's and doctor's
degree, was made lecturer in anthropology. Later he was placed upon the "life list"
of Harvard instructors. He was soon compelled to leave Harvard because of ill health,
but went to Arizona, spending his time in studying the Apache Indians for the United
States government department of ethnology. He later returned to Harvard where he
remained until June of this year, when again he was compelled to go to Arizona for
his health. At the time he left Harvard he was under the doctor's care but, notwith-
standing this fact, he was preparing an anthropological report for the government
upon the measurements of 800 Syrians, another report for the government upon the
Apache Indians, and in addition was doing his regular work at Harvard University.

Mr. Russell bore many honors at the time of his death. He was president of the Folk
Lore Society, chairman of his section of the American Association, and associate
editor of the American Anthropologist.

A. G. Smith, professor of mathematics in the University who has been a long close
friend of Mr. Russell, paid him the following tribute:

"Mr. Russell was a quiet, reserved man, with a hatred of bombast and hypocracy that
was unique ... a man who held his friends wiht hooks of steel. He loved his fellowman
and hated not the man but the evil the man did. He was a man of the strongest convictions
who paraded them but little. He acknowledged no such thing as the impossible; he overcame
difficulties that other men would have refused to try."

President McLean said that Mr. Russell was a man of whom the Iowa State University felt
proud and for whom it mourned.                   by: Frank R. Wilson