What is the star system?
The star system calculates the number of pieces that were handled by Conchology, Inc. in the last 21 years:
| 0 – 5 pieces | 6 stars |
|
| 6 – 10 pieces | 5 stars |
|
| 11 - 25 pieces | 4 stars | |
| 26 - 75 pieces | 3 stars | |
| 76 - 150 pieces | 2 stars | |
| > 150 pieces | 1 star | |
We want to point out that the star system is only very reliable for PHILIPPINE shells only, as we handle very few foreign shells in general. As time goes, the system will become more and more performant.
Shellers From the Past and the Present
Frank Maartense
With "Shellers From the Past and the Present" Tom Rice brings us back to the founding fathers of our mutual hobby. Tom's magnificent database is one of a kind. It gives us a great insight in how people dealt with shells in earlier times and how they look at it nowadays: Tom built a bridge from the past to the present. But, above all, Tom strengthens the shellers community by bringing people together. This really appeals me.
I have been given the great opportunity to work on the database. "Shellers from the Past and the Present" is of high importance and therefore it should remain accessible for the coming generations too. When a next generation shellers search for names they will find you: then you are the shellers from the past. I look at it this way: "Shellers from the past and the present for the benefit of the shellers in the future".
I am collecting shells for over 35 years, fascinated by their colour, form, habitat, people behind and why their names were given. My collection at my home in The Netherlands gives me a good view about the huge diversity of shells and, of course, the many shellers from the past and the present.
Please have a closer look to all these wonderful people in "Shellers From the Past and the Present" and add yourselves if not done yet. It is so easy. Become a part of the family.
Contact Frank Maartense by email.
Tom Rice (1939 - 2022)
When I first started to scientifically collect shells, some 55 years ago, I noted the "authors" of the shell species. Who were these scholars' Through the next half-century I would meet many of them, as well as others, like myself, who simply enjoyed the form, color and complexity of the animals we call mollusks.
Shift to the present day. Several years ago I ceased research and publications of several directors, my magazine – Of Sea and Shore, which at its peak reached collectors in more than 60 countries – and the infamous “Rice’s Prices” (aka “A Catalog of Dealers’ Prices for Shells: Marine, Land and Freshwater” [1965-2007, 23 editions]). I undertook several short-term projects, but soon found myself feeling that I wasn’t keeping my brain active. What to do?
Over the years I had accumulated a number of photographs of shellers met during conventions, shelling trips around the world, or as visitors to my shell museum (Of Sea and Shore Museum of Shells and Natural History, Inc. in Port Gamble, Washington [State], U.S.A.). Now going back through these I wondered, “whatever became of these people and their collections”? So I began to gather information. Fortunately this new-fangled technological marvel, the Internet helped a great deal. My file of information started to grow, as did the one of photos. Then I came across two wonderful sources of information that caused me to greatly expand the scope of this project. First was the American Malacological Society’s “2400 Years of Malacology” which listed thousands of malacologists from around the world and throughout the centuries. Second was the BEMON (Biographical Etymology of Marine Organism Names) blog, which gave more information on many of those in the 2400YM, as well as others for whom species (and genera) of mollusks were named.
As my files grew I became more and more interested in adding names and information. Suddenly I had more than 20,000 names on my “list” and several thousand photos in files. I had planned this entire project as an exercise for my mind and planned to use it for myself only. I then took a CD of the files to show Guido and Philippe Poppe and they encouraged me to continue my research and to agree to put my files onto their web site and invite others to add names, information, photos, correction, etc... This sounded exciting and I readily agreed.
Hans Sloane
Sir Hans Sloane, 1st Baronet, PRS FRS (16 April 1660 – 11 January 1753), was an Irish physician, naturalist and collector noted for bequeathing his collection of 71,000 items to the British nation, thus providing the foundation of the British Museum, the British Library and the Natural History Museum, London. He was elected to the Royal Society at the age of 25. Sloane traveled to the Caribbean in 1687 and documented his travels and findings with extensive publishings years later. Sloane was a renowned medical doctor among the aristocracy and was elected to the Royal College of Physicians by age 27.
His name was later used for streets and places such as Hans Place, Hans Crescent, and Sloane Square in and around Chelsea, London – the area of his final residence – and also for Sir Hans Sloane Square in his birthplace in Ireland, Killyleagh.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Joseph Banks
Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, (1743 – 1820) was an English naturalist, botanist and patron of the natural sciences.
Banks made his name on the 1766 natural history expedition to Newfoundland and Labrador. He took part in Captain James Cook's first great voyage (1768–1771), visiting Brazil, Tahiti, and, after 6 months in New Zealand, Australia, returning to immediate fame. He held the position of President of the Royal Society for over 41 years. He advised King George III on the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and by sending botanists around the world to collect plants, he made Kew the world's leading botanical gardens.
Banks advocated British settlement in New South Wales and colonisation of Australia, as well as the establishment of Botany Bay as a place for the reception of convicts, and advised the British government on all Australian matters. He is credited with introducing the eucalyptus, acacia, and the genus named after him, Banksia, to the Western world. Approximately 80 species of plants bear his name. He was the leading founder of the African Association and a member of the Society of Dilettanti which helped to establish the Royal Academy.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Hugh Cuming
Hugh Cuming (14 February 1791 – 10 August 1865) was an English collector who was interested in natural history, particularly in conchology and botany. He has been described as the "Prince of Collectors".
Born in England, he spent a number of years in Chile, where he became a successful businessman. He used the money he saved to buy a ship that was specifically built for collecting specimens, and travelled extensively on collecting trips amassing many thousands of specimens. After his death, much of his material was bought by the Natural History Museum in London. A number of species are named after him.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Henry Augustus Pilsbry
Henry Augustus Pilsbry (7 December 1862 – 26 October 1957) was an American biologist, malacologist and carcinologist, among other areas of study. He was a dominant presence in many fields of invertebrate taxonomy for the better part of a century. For much of his career, his authority with respect to the classification of certain substantial groups of organisms was unchallenged: barnacles, chitons, North American terrestrial mollusks, and others.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Philippe Dautzenberg
Philippe Dautzenberg (Ixelles, Brussels, 20 December 1849 – Paris, 9 May 1935) was a Belgian malacologist, a biologist who specializes in the branch of invertebrate zoology that deals with mollusks. He was an amateur and autodidact, who was actually the owner of a carpet and soft furnishings factory. He was also a devoted family man with 12 children.
He assembled, thanks to his many connections all over the world, a large part of the shell collection of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, which consists of 9,000,000 specimens and is one of the three largest shell collections in the world.
He was a participant in the scientific surveys of Prince Albert I of Monaco and the author of 210 published works (between 1881 and 1937 (post mortem) )in the field of malacology. He described 1895 new taxa. He collected shells from an early age, resulting in his personal collection of about 4.5 million specimens, relating to 33,000 Recent taxa and 7,000 fossil species. He referenced 82,000 specimens on filing cards.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Lovell Augustus Reeve
Lovell Augustus Reeve (19 April 1814 – 18 November 1865) was an English conchologist and publisher.
Reeve was the author of many publications on mollusc shells, the best known of which is Conchologia iconica, or, Illustrations of the shells of molluscous animals, which spanned 20 volumes and contained about 27,000 figures.
Text and image source from Wikipedia.
Philippe Bouchet
Philippe Bouchet (born 1953) is a French malacologist whose primary field of study is marine gastropods, combining classical shell-based and modern molecular approaches. He works at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris and has been organizing numerous expeditions in three océans - both shore-based and deep-sea -, leading to the discovery of many thousand new species which are being worked up and described by an international network of professional and non-professional systematists.
Bouchet has himself named over 650 new taxa of mollusks, and numerous taxa have been named in his honor. Together with colleague Jean-Pierre Rocroi and several co-authors Bouchet published in 2005 (revised in 2017) "Nomenclator and classification of gastropod families", which is currently the reference gastropod classification.
| 1 | Marco Taviani | 66668 |
| 2 | Philippe Poppe | 721 |
| 3 | Nicolas Paquien | 199 |
| 4 | Manfred Herrmann | 163 |
| 5 | Marianne Wong | 146 |
| 6 | Wim J.m. Maassen | 129 |
| 7 | Roy Aiken | 112 |
| 8 | John Abbas | 95 |
| 9 | Andrea Nappo | 94 |
| 10 | Tom Meijer | 87 |
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Frank and Tom, Bangkok, Thailand, February 2020.
RANDOM SHELLERS
