James L. Reveal

20th century American botanist known for contributions to taxonomy

James Lauritz Reveal (March 29, 1941 – January 9, 2015) was a U. S. botanist best known for his contributions to the genus Eriogonum and for his work on suprageneric names. His website, at PlantSystematics. org, also presents material on plant taxonomy including the Reveal system. He published extensively on North American flora, was a member of the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group, and was one of the authors of the APG II and APG III classifications. At the time of his death, Reveal was a professor emeritus at the University of Maryland, adjunct professor at Cornell University's Department of Plant Biology and honorary curator at the New York Botanical Garden.

James Lauritz Reveal was born on March 29, 1941, in Reno, Nevada to Arlene Hadfield Reveal and Jack Lilburn Reveal (1912 1988), a librarian and a forester/botanist, respectively. Reveal attended Utah State University (B. S. 1964, M. S. 1966) and received his Ph. D. from Brigham Young University in 1969. He held a post doctoral fellowship with the Smithsonian Institution from 1967 to 1969.

In 1969, Reveal joined the Botany faculty at the University of Maryland, serving as director of the Norton Brown Herbarium of the University of Maryland between 1979 and 1999. During his tenure, the Norton Brown Herbarium amassed one of the greatest collections of Polygonaceae subfam. Eriogonoideae in the world. As a member of the Smithsonian Institution's Endangered Species Committee (1974 1982), Reveal was instrumental in attaining the addition of endangered plant species to the original Endangered Species Act. In 1978, Reveal married his University of Maryland colleague, the botanist C. Rose Broome (later with the Agricultural Research Service of the U. S. Department of Agriculture). They collaborated on many research projects, most notably the botanical studies of colonial Maryland and explorations in Mexico that identified two new plant varieties. In 1992, Reveal's illustrated Gentle Conquest: The Botanical Discovery of North America was published. Gentle Conquest encompasses the history of botanical exploration in the New World from the first settlement to the end of the Western frontier. Reveal retired from the Botany Department at the University of Maryland in 1999, but remained active, holding emeritus appointments including Honorary Curator of the New York Botanical Garden (2003 2015) and Adjunct Professor at Cornell University (2007 2015), working on the Intermountain Flora project and collecting plant specimens throughout several Western U. S. states, including California, Colorado, and Nevada. He made numerous contributions to the website, Discovering Lewis & Clark. In 2009, Reveal received the North American Rock Garden Society's Edgar T. Wherry award for his contributions to the genus Eriogonum. Reveal died on January 9, 2015, in Ithaca, New York.

Reveal made major contributions to the systematic taxonomy of the flowering plants. in 1997 he published his own system of classification online in ten parts as lecture notes comparing the major systems in use at that time, but without accompanying rationale. Following this Reveal became an author with the consensus Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (APG) on the APG II 2003 and APG III 2009 processes. Although this largely supplanted the earlier and competing systems, he collaborated with Robert Thorne on his system (2007), and subsequently continued to develop his own system.

See C. V.

Chase, M. W., J. L. Reveal & M. F. Fay. 2009. A subfamilial classification for the expanded asparagalean families Amaryllidaceae, Asparagaceae and Xanthorrhoeaceae Bot. J. Linn. Soc. 161: 132–136. Doweld, A. & J. L. Reveal. 2008. New suprageneric names for vascular plants. Phytologia 90: 416–417. Reveal, J. L. & J. C. Pires. 2002. "Phylogeny and classification of the monocotyledons: An update," pp. 3–36. In: Flora of North America Editorial Committee (ed. ), Flora of North America north of Mexico. Vol. 26. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford. Kiger, R. W. & J. L. Reveal. 2000. A comprehensive scheme for standardized abbreviation of usable plant family names and type based suprafamilial names. Huntia 11: 55–84. Update 2005
Reveal, J. L. & A. B. Doweld. 1999. Validation of some suprageneric names in Magnoliophyta. Novon 9: 549–553. Reveal, J. L. 1998. Seventeen proposals to amend the Code on suprageneric names. Taxon 47: 183–192. Reveal, J. L. 1996. "What's in a name: Identifying plants in pre Linnaean botanical literature," pp. 57–90. In: B. Holland (ed. ), Prospecting for drugs in ancient and medieval European texts: A scientific approach. Harword Academic Publishers, Paris. Reveal, J. L. 1996. A guide to scientific names of vascular plants. Probe 6(July): 16–17. Reveal, J. L. 1994. New supraordinal names in Magnoliophyta and the recognition of five classes in the division. Phytologia 76: 1–7. Hoogland, R. D. & J. L. Reveal. 1993. "Vascular plant family names in current use," pp 15–60. In: W. Greuter (ed. ), NCU 1. Family names in current use for vascular plants, bryophytes, and fungi. Koeltz Scientific Books, Konigstein, Germany
Jarvis, C. E., F. R. Barrie, D. Allan & J. L. Reveal. 1993. A list of Linnaean generic names and their types. Koeltz Scientific Books, Konigstein, Germany. 100 pp. Reveal, J. L. 1993. "Flowering plant families: An overview," pp. 294–330. In: Flora of North America Editorial Committee (ed. ), Flora of North America north of Mexico. Vol. 1. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford. Reveal, J. L. 1993. New ordinal names for extant vascular plants. Phytologia 74: 173–177. Reveal, J. L. 1993. New subclass and supraordinal names for extant vascular plants. Phytologia 74: 178–179. Reveal, J. L. 1993. Automatically typified supraordinal and ordinal names for the flowering plants (Magnoliophyta as recognized by Thorne (1992) and arranged following the principles of priority, autonymy and the substitution of alternative names. Phytologia 74: 193–202. Reveal, J. L. 1993. A splitter's guide to the higher taxa of the flowering plants (Magnoliophyta) generally arranged to follow the sequence proposed by Thorne (1992) with certain modifications. Phytologia 74: 203–263. Reveal, J. L. 1993. A preliminary list of validly published automatically typified ordinal names of vascular plants. Taxon 42: 825–844. Reveal, J. L. 1992. Validation of subclass and supraordinal names in Magnoliophyta. Novon 2: 235–237. Reveal, J. L. 1992. Validation of ordinal names of extant vascular plants. Novon 2: 238–240. Reveal, J. L. & R. D. Hoogland. 1992. [Family nomenclature for] "Part 2. Families and genera alphabetically in major groups", p. 461–751. In: R. K. Brummitt (comp. ), Vascular plant families and genera. Royal Botanic Garden, Kew. Reveal, J. L. & R. D. Hoogland. 1991. "Protected plant family names – a new list for consideration," p. 243–249. In: D. L. Hawksworth (ed. ), Improving the stability of names: Needs and options. Koeltz Scientific Books, Königstein/Taunus, Germany. Reveal, J. L. & R. D. Hoogland. 1991. Validation of three family names in the Magnoliophyta. Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. ser. 4, sect. B Adansonia 13: 91–93. Reveal, J. L. & R. D. Hoogland. 1991. Conservation proposals for three generic names of Magnoliophyta. Taxon 40: 650–652. Reveal, J. L. 1983. The need for an index to infra taxonomic entities. Taxon 32: 622. Reveal, J. L. 1987, Botanical explorations and discoveries in colonial Maryland: an introduction, Huntia, 7: 1 3. Reveal, J. L. & H. G. Bedell. 1983. Add the rank superorder denoted by anae. Taxon 32: 661–662. Bedell, H. G. & J. L. Reveal. 1982. An outline and index to Takhtajan's 1980 classification of flowering plants. Taxon 31: 211–232. Bedell, H. G. & J. L. Reveal. 1982. Amended outlines and indices for six recently published systems of angiosperm classification. Phytologia 51: 65–156. Bedell, H. G. & J. L. Reveal. 1982. A synoptical review of a revised classification of Liliopsida (Magnoliophyta) as proposed by Dahlgren and Clifford. Phytologia 52: 179–183.