Carroll William Dodge

Carroll William Dodge (January 20, 1895 – July 21, 1988) was an American mycologist and lichenologist.

His major field of study were human and mammalian parasitic fungus, lichen associated fungus and fungi forming subterranean sporophores.

Carroll William Dodge was born in Danby, Vermont. He started his early education from Burr and Burton Seminaries in Manchester, Vermont. He went to Middlebury College at Vermont to study classical language and there he received his Artium Baccalaureus in 1915 and completed his master's in 1916. During his stay at Middlebury, he came in contact with Edward Angus Burt (1859-1939) who was another mycologist, today known as an authority of terrestrial fungi, Thelephoraceae. Carroll was inspired by Angus Burt and his interest grew in biology and followed Burt to Washington University at St. Louis, Missouri as Lachland Fellow. He was so interested in botany that he left Rhodes scholarship to Oxford University, withdrew his nomination and went to Washington University to complete his doctorate.He did his PhD in plant physiology and biochemistry under Benjamin M. Duggar in 1918.

After his PhD, he served in US Army as a specialist in Office of Nutrition, Camp Pevon, Massachusetts during 1918-1919. After one year of service in the US Army, he worked as an associated chemist in Dairy Division of United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).

He again joined back to academia in 1919 as an instructor in botany at Brown University in Rhode Island and took a class in phycology. There he became Onley Assistant Professor of Botany and finally he entered Harvard in 1921 as an instructor in botany and became assistant professor and Curator of Farlow Library of Herbarium in 1924. He doubled the herbarium collection during his stay in the library by purchasing adding from his own collection. Today, he is considered as one of the important collector of lichen in Farlow Library of Herbarium.During his stay in Harvard, from the mid-1920s he started studying fungal diseases in human and collected a lot of information such that he offered the first course in medical mycology in America.In 1931, he became professor of botany at Washington University. He finally retired in 1963. During his stay in Washington University at St. Louis he visited Latin American Countries; Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Chile and Brazil and taught several courses in medical mycology and lichenology in those countries. His interest in human pathogenic fungi lead to the publication of a very popular book “Medical mycology” in 1935.

Another area of Dodge’s study is lichenology. He is regarded as American authority of tropical and Antarctic lichens. He mainly focused in taxonomic and floristics of lichen. He developed the keys for lichen identification. His peak period of lichen study was from 1950 to 1960s. He had traveled extensively to study lichen and produced a lot of papers related to lichens of different locations. He has published articles describing the lichens of tropical Africa, Gaspe Peninsula, Venezuela, Brazil, Tonga, Chile, Kerguelen Island, and New Zealand. He was funded by National science museum for his trip to Antarctica in 1961. He studied lichens for several years in Antarctica and published a book ‘Lichen Flora of the Antarctic Continent and Adjacent Islands in 1973.

Dodge also studied about subterranean sporophores. Research articles related to Rhizopogonaceae, Gauiteria, Arcangeliella, Gymnomyces and Macromanites, Leucogastor and Leucophlebs were found during his early academic life.

Carroll William Dodge died in July 21, 1988 in Vermont.

In 1931, Dodge was head of the International Association of Plant Taxonomists Section on Lichens and in 1950, he was Vice-President for Medical Mycology of the Rio de Janeiro International Congress of Microbiology.

His honors include: election to Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Xi, and Gamma Alpha (National Councilor, 1923-1928; National Secretary, 1927); doctorates by the Universidad Nacional de Guatemala (1942) and the Universidad Nacional de Chile (1950); perpetual honorary member of the Societe Linneenne de Lyon, and the American Microscopical Society (and Centennial Award, 1978). He received the medal of the Society of Medical Mycologists of the Americas in 1976.

The list of Dodge's organizational affiliations includes: American Association for the Advancement of Science, the New England Botanical Club, the Botanical Society of America (chairman of mycology, 1920's), the British Mycological Society, the American Microscopical Society (vice-president, 1938), and the American Phytopathological Society. He also served on the editorial boards of Botanical Abstracts, Biological Abstracts, and Rhodora.

More than seventy scholarly articles written by Dodge can be found between 1918 and 1982. Similarly, as many as eighty books written by Dodge can be found. Although most of his books are written in English, some books are in Spanish, French and German.

Besides mycology and biology, Carroll William Dodge was interested in Latin American history and literature. This can be known by his appointment as Harvard University Librarian to purchase literary and historical volumes in many countries he visited. He could read and write in both classical and modern languages. Further, he could give lectures in fluent Spanish and Portuguese. In 1925, Dodge married Bertha Sanford Weiner, who was a daughter of his Russian Professor at Harvard. His wife was also an author of several books in economic botany, popular science and exploration. They had two daughters Anne Caroline Dodge Hooper and Mary Lavina Dodge Cobb, both of whom were musically talented.