George J. Wallace papers

Record Group

Identifier: UA-17.50

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

The papers include some correspondence, course materials, bibliographies, honors and newspaper clippings on Wallace. The bulk of the materials are copies and reprints of articles that were written by Wallace. The materials deal primarily with the field of ornithology including a statement given to the House Subcommittee on Fisheries and Wildlife on the effects of DDT in 1960. Also included are issues of the Michigan Pesticide Council Newsletter.

Dates

Creation: 1937 - 1971

Creator

Wallace, George John, 1906- (Donor, Person)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Permission to publish material from this collection must be obtained from University Archives & Historical Collections, Michigan State University.

Biographical Note

George J. Wallace was born in Vermont and it was there that he began a life-long interest in ornithology. He earned his A. B, M.A. and Ph.D. (1927) from the University of Michigan. He met his wife, Martha Cooper, at the University of Michigan and they were married in 1934.They had two daughters, Sylvia and Myra.

After graduation, he spent a year with the Vermont Fish and Game Service and then became director of a bird and wildlife sanctuary in Massachusetts. In 1942, Wallace joined the faculty in the Department of Zoology at Michigan State College (now Michigan State University). During the next three decades, he researched ornothology topics, including bird mortality. He was the author of one of the most used textbooks on ornithology.

He linked the mortality of robins with the spraying of DDT, a pesticide used to treat Dutch Elm disease on campus and in East Lansing in the 1950s and 1960s, in a paper published in 1961. At the time, he was critized and nearly lost his job.

Wallace died in 1986.