MURIEL AGNES ARBER (1913-2004)

[Rudi Schmid]

                  MURIEL AGNES ARBER (1913-2004)

        Muriel Agnes Arber, the only child of renowned botanist Agnes Arber, née
Robertson (23
Feb. 1879-22 Mar. 1960) and geologist-paleobotanist Edward Alexander Newell
Arber (5 Aug.
1870-14 June 1918), died in a Cambridge hospital of the infirmities of age.
She was born on 21 July
1913 in Cambridge in the family home at 52 Huntingdon Dr. Except for two
unhappy years at a
boarding school in Kent, she lived entirely in Cambridge, initially at 52
Huntingdon until shortly
after her mother's death, then in a nearby flat at 18 Sherlock Close, and,
finally, from July 2003
onward in various residential and medical facilities. A graduate of Newnham
College, Cambridge
University (B.A. 1935, M.A. 1938), Muriel Arber did her thesis work on
strophomenid brachiopods,
taught high school until her retirement in 1973, and while teaching and
after her retirement did
research on the valleys, cliffs, and landslips of southwestern England. Her
honors included two
presidencies of the Geologists' Association (1972-73, 1973-74) and the R. H.
Worth Prize of the
Geological Society in 1970. She wrote two books: _The old mermaid and other
poems_ (1951) and
_Lyme landscape with figures_ (1988, with a two-page foreword by John
Fowles). Muriel Arber is
known to botanists by virtue of bibliographies of her mother, father, and
Ethel Sargant (1863-1918)
(M. Arber, _J. Soc. Bibliogr. Nat. Hist._ 4: 370-384, 1968, 5: 70, 1968; R.
Schmid & M. Arber,
_Ibid._ 8: 180-183, 1977) as well as prefaces in three reprints of her
mother's books:
_Monocotyledons_ (1925, 1961 reprint), _Herbals,_ 2nd ed. (1938, 1970
reprint), and _The natural
philosophy of plant form_ (1950, 1970 reprint).
        Muriel Arber was an exceptionally cheerful person, was very sharp-minded,
and had a superb
recall of dates and names of people and places. She possessed a sly sense of
humor, to wit: in 1912
her father did consulting work on the Kent coal fields and the family was
better off financially; thus
"I owe my existence to the Kent coal fields" (11 June 2003 interview).
        A May-2000 photo of Muriel appear on my website
(http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~schmid/arber/AA_churchyard.html) as well as
pictures and
information on her mother, Agnes Arber
(http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~schmid/arber).

Rudolf ("Rudi") Schmid, Department of Integrative Biology,
   University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-3140, USA
   OR (for TAXON): 16 Edwin Dr., Kensington, CA 94707-1022
"Reviews and notices of publications" editor, TAXON (see below)
email: schmid at socrates.berkeley.edu
website: http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~schmid
phone: (510) 525-0439; fax (510) 643-6264
websites for the International Association for Plant Taxonomy
   (IAPT) and its journal TAXON: www.botanik.univie.ac.at/iapt
   and http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~schmid/taxonIAPT.html