Robert Greenleaf Leavitt

Dr. Robert Greenleaf Leavitt (1865–1942) was an early American Harvard-educated botanist and widely published author in the field of botany, as well as an early college and high school educator in the natural sciences. Leavitt also worked for nine years as a botanical researcher at the Ames Botanical Laboratory in North Easton, Massachusetts.

Biography Dr. Leavitt was born in Parsonsfield, Maine. His parents were Susan Chapman Blazo and John Greenleaf Leavitt, a Congregational minister, who had been married in the early 1860s. Hean early botany professor at Harvard College, where he had graduated in the class of 1889 after attending Worcester Academy. Then went to Harvard College, living in Cambridge. While there he went in for athletics and became intercollegiate pole vault champion as well as a prize-winning jumper.

Leavitt subsequently earned his Doctor of Philosophy in biology at Harvard in 1904. He wrote Leavitt's Outlines of Botany,a standard text book at the time; it was published by the Harvard University Press.

In the following years, Leavitt authored many textbooks in the field of botany, many for high school students, including his Outlines of Botany for the High School Laboratory and Classroom, which was widely reprinted.

Robert Greenleaf Leavitt was the son of John Greenleaf Leavitt, an early student at Parsonsfield Seminary at Parsonsfield, Maine, who returned to his alma mater in 1861 to serve as the school's principal for one year, when he married Susan C. Blazo, daughter of one of the Seminary's co-founders. (Dr. Leavitt served as a trustee for the Parsonsfield Seminary. ) Rev. J. Greenleaf Leavitt later spent his life as a Congregationalist minister at Webster, Massachusetts. The home built by his wife's Blazo ancestors descended in the family of Rev. Greenleaf Leavitt. (The Blazo-Leavitt House is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.)

Dr. Leavitt married Ida Gertrude (Ruggli) Leavitt, a 1901 graduate of Radcliffe College, at Arlington, Massachusetts in 1906, following the death of his first wife Janet (Shumway). Robert Greenleaf Leavitt and his first wife had two sons, Robert and Russell, both of whom attended Harvard College. Dr. Leavitt and his second wife Ida Ruggli had two daughters, Rosamund, who died in infancy, and Constance. Following his service as a high school teacher in New Jersey, Robert Greenleaf Leavitt retired to his farm in Maine, where he raised 40 varieties of apples.

Books Robert Greenleaf Leavitt. Outlines of botany for the high school laboratory and classroom (based on Gray's Lessons in botany) 1901 [Hardcover]. Publisher: Facsimile Publisher (2015) Robert Greenleaf Leavitt. The Geographic Distribution Of Closely Related Species. Publisher: Nabu Press (13 April 2012) Robert Greenleaf Leavitt.The Forest Trees of New England. Publisher: The Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University (1932) Robert Greenleaf Leavitt.Trichomes of the Root in Vascular Cryptogams and Angiosperms (Classic Reprint). Publisher: Forgotten Books (26 Nov. 2016) Robert Greenleaf Leavitt.Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, Vol. 31, No. 7, p.273-313, pl. 16-19; Trichomes of the Root in Vascular Cryptogams and Angiosperms. Publisher: Leopold Classic Library (20 Oct. 2015)