Georgia Mason

Georgia Mason (March 16, 1910 - October 8, 2007) was a botanist at the University of Oregon and author of Guide to the Plants of the Wallowa Mountains of Northeastern Oregon, and Plants of Wet to Moist Habitats in and Around Eugene Oregon.

Biography

Georgia Mason was born Georgia Mavropoulos in West Orange, New Jersey, the daughter of Greek immigrants, Peter and Bessie Mavropoulos. She taught grades 1 through 7 in New Jersey public schools from 1931-1941. It was during this time, that she changed her name to Mason for easier pronunciation. From 1941 through 1958, she taught science courses to grades 6 through 9.

Mason was awarded a National Science Foundation grant to study for a Master of Science degree at Oregon State College (now Oregon State University) in Corvallis, Oregon. She started classes in 1958 at the age of 49, and graduated in 1960. She stayed in Oregon for the rest of her life. was first published by the University of Oregon in 1975. Plants of Wet to Moist Habitats in and Around Eugene Oregon. was self-published in 1983. She founded an endowment for student work in the herbarium at Oregon State University in 1978.

In all, Mason donated 4,549 specimens to Oregon herbaria, fourth-most of Oregon collectors as of 2010. She also collected in Washington, Wyoming, and Nebraska. While curator at UO, she also mounted, labelled and accessioned roughly 3,000 specimens collected by Oregon botanist Lilla Leach; incorporated the approximately 3,800 collections of Eugene collector Orlin Ireland; formally accessioned hundreds of specimens; and updated names on hundreds of herbarium sheets in accordance with the 1973 "Flora of the Pacific Northwest" (Hitchcock and Cronquist) and other new floral references.