William Schaus

William Schaus (January 11, 1858, in New York City – June 20, 1942) was an American entomologist who became known for his major contribution to the knowledge and description of new species of the Neotropical Lepidoptera.

Life William Schaus Jr. was son of Wilhelm (later William) Schaus Sr. (1821–1892), a German-immigrant art collector and dealer, proprietor of the Schaus Galleries in New York City, and of Margaret Connover.

He was educated initially at Exeter Academy and then in France and Germany, in 1901 and 1905.

In 1919 Schaus joined the Bureau of Entomology of the United States Department of Agriculture and, in 1921, began a long association with the Smithsonian Institution as an honorary curator of insects in the United States National Museum, He purchased most of the Dognin Collection

Legacy He described 329 new genera and over five thousand new species of Lepidoptera, mostly from tropical America.

The genera Schausia and Schausiana were named in his honor, as well as numerous species with the specific epithet schausi . The common names of the Schaus's crow and Schaus' swallowtail butterflies also refer to him.

Selected works American Lepidoptera: illustrations of new and rare species. Part I, London: R. H. Porter, 1892. (Work digitized by Biodiversity Heritage Library at ) Descriptions of new American butterflies 1902. Kessinger Publishing (2010 reprint)