[George Brown]. American ichthyologist, born in New Albany, IN, on the 13th of February 1851. He graduated at Wesleyan University in 1870, and in 1871 became an assistant in the natural history museum at that institution. His work there resulted in a call to the Smithsonian Institution in 1873, where, from 1874 to 1887, he was chief of the division of fisheries. In 1887 he was appointed United States Fish Commissioner, but resigned the following year to become assistant secretary of the Smithsonian Institution and director of the National Museum. His knowledge of museum administration, together with his rank as an ichthyologist and general scientist, placed him among the foremost of American scholars. He was director of the Natural History Division at the Centennial Exhibition of 1876; United States commissioner to the international fisheries, exhibitions at Berlin (1880) and at London (1883); represented the Smithsonian Institution at the expositions in New Orleans, Cincinnati and Louisville in 1884, Chicago in 1893, and Atlanta in 1895. He wrote numerous papers on ichthyology and allied subjects. Among his publications are Game-Fishes of the United States (1879); American Fisheries (1880); Natural History of the Bermudas (1882); American Fishes (1887); and Oceanic Ichthyology (1894). He died in Washington, DC, on the 6th of September 1896.
