New York Zoological Park. Offices of Director and Department of Herpetology Curator. James A. Oliver records

During the course of his career James A. Oliver held various positions at some of New York City's most prominent science institutions, specifically at the American Museum of Natural History [AMNH] and at the New York Zoological Society's Bronx Zoo and New York Aquarium.

While growing up in St. Louis, Missouri, James Oliver kept reptiles from an early age and, during his teenage years, worked with Marlin Perkins, who at the time was the Herpetology Curator at the St. Louis Zoo. Oliver received his collegiate and post-graduate education at the University of Michigan; in the course of that work he went on reptile collecting expeditions for the University's Museum of Zoology—University President and former Museum Director Alexander Ruthven chaired his dissertation committee—and became friends with many leading and/or up-and-coming herpetologists, including Helen Thompson Gaige and Norman Hartweg. Upon obtaining his doctorate in 1942, the Chairman of AMNH's Department of Herpetology, Charles M. Bogert, hired Oliver as Assistant Curator of Herpetology. Oliver's tenure at AMNH—where he eventually became Associate Curator—was interrupted by his service in the U.S. Navy during the Second World War. In 1948 Oliver left AMNH for an assistant professorship in the University of Florida's Biology Department; after three years, in 1951, the New York Zoological Society [NYZS] hired him away from that position to return to New York City as the New York Zoological Park's Curator of Herpetology.

At the New York Zoological Park—more commonly known as the Bronx Zoo—Oliver thrived. Under his direction the Herpetology Department's animal collections and research efforts flourished and he had the Reptile House thoroughly renovated and modernized. Oliver was part of several notable projects, including the first breeding and rearing of king cobras in captivity, collecting and research trips in the field, and the founding of both the Caribbean Conservation Corporation and the New York Herpetological Society. Snakes, and especially venomous snakes, were a particular focus of his work, and the subject of the most famous of his numerous popular and academic written works, Snakes in Fact and Fiction (1958). At the same time, Oliver also held several leadership positions in outside organizations, including the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, where he served on the editorial board for the journal Copeia.

In 1956, Bronx Zoo Director John Tee Van vacated that position to concentrate on his work as the Society's General Director. In 1958 Oliver, who had been named the Zoo's Assistant Director in the interim, was promoted to Director of the Zoo. Oliver stayed in that position for a year before leaving in the summer of 1959 to return to the American Museum of Natural History as its Director. After a decade (1959-1969) at AMNH, Oliver came back to NYZS, this time as Director of the New York Aquarium, from which he retired in 1976.

For more information on Oliver's later career, see the finding aid for collection 3011: New York Aquarium Director James A. Oliver records, 1966-1977 (bulk 1970-1976). Further information on Oliver—including a bibliography of his writings, a list of species named after him, and additional achievements—can be found in his Wikipedia biography and in his New York Times obituary.

1936

BA, University of Michigan

1937

MA, University of Michigan

1942

PhD, University of Michigan

1942, 1946-1948

Assistant/Associate Curator, American Museum of Natural History

1943-1946

Service in WWII

1948-1951

Assistant Professor, University of Florida

1948-1959

Research Associate, American Museum of Natural History

1951-1959

Herpetology Curator, New York Zoological Park (also Curator of Insects, 1951-1952)

1958-1959

Director, New York Zoological Park

1959-1969

Director, American Museum of Natural History

1970-1976

Director, New York Aquarium