Thure Kumlien

Thure Ludwig Theodor Kumlien (November 9, 1819 – August 5, 1888) was a Swedish-American ornithologist, naturalist, and taxidermist. A contemporary of Thoreau, Audubon, and Agassiz, he contributed much to the knowledge of the natural history of Wisconsin and its birds. He collected and shipped specimens to many investigators in the United States and abroad. He taught botany and zoology, as well as foreign languages, at Albion Academy, and was particularly regarded as an expert in the identification of birds’ nests.

Family and early life Thure Kumlien was born in 1819 in the parish of Härlunda in Västergötland, Sweden, the oldest of fourteen children in an aristocratic Swedish family. His father, Ludwig Kumlien (1790–1839), was an army quartermaster, and owned several large estates. His mother, Johanna Rhodin (1800–1830) was the daughter of a minister.

It was also during his university years that Kumlien met Margretta Christine Wallberg, described as “the most beautiful girl of all this nation of handsome women.” Despite opposition from the King, the Church, and Thure’s father due to differences in social standing. Margretta was the daughter of a minor officer in the Swedish Army responsible for the King’s cavalry horses, the couple became engaged.

In 1843, seeking new opportunities and perhaps to overcome familial objections, Thure and Margretta emigrated to the United States, accompanied by Margretta’s older sister, Sophia. They endured a challenging ten-week voyage aboard the leaky ship Swea Maria, arriving in New York on August 20, 1843. Shortly after, they settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Thure and Margretta married on September 5, 1843. Kumlien did not succeed at farming; Combined with his modesty, his collecting and correspondence made him more widely known to fellow scientists than to his neighbors. From 1867 to 1870, he taught not only botany and zoology, but also foreign languages; he left when financial turmoil hit the college. He took a position with the State of Wisconsin in 1870, and the teacher training school (the university's collections were destroyed in a fire in 1884). From 1881 to 1883, he worked for the Wisconsin Natural History Society as taxidermist and conservator of its collections. He edited the exsiccata-like series Plantae Visconsinenses.

In 1883, the Natural History Society's collections were transferred to the Milwaukee Public Museum, and Kumlien began working for the museum in the same capacity, He is buried at Sweet Cemetery, in Albion.

Kumlien trained his son, Ludwig Kumlien, an ornithologist, and also Edward Lee Greene, a botanist.

Kumlien was also acquainted with Willard North, the father of author Sterling North; the younger North included him in such books as Rascal and The Wolfling.

A number of species have been named for Kumlien:

Aster Kumlienii Benke, a purple aster that grows at Busseyville. Cottus bairdii kumlienii (Hoy), the northern mottled sculpin. Kumlienia is a genus of flowering plants in the buttercup family. It was named for Kumlien by his student Greene.