Dr. Marshall Ralph Wheeler, PhD

Marshall Ralph Wheeler, PhD

ENS US Navy WWII

Obituary

Dr. Marshall R. Wheeler, age 92, retired Professor of Zoology, University of Texas at Austin, died Sunday, January 3, 2010. Marshall Ralph Wheeler was born on April 7, 1917 in Carlinville, Illinois, the son of Ralph and Hester Ward Wheeler.

He attended Blackburn College and later received a B.A. degree cum laude at Baylor University. He was a graduate student and teaching assistant with a Biology major and Entomology minor at Texas A&M University, then transferred to the University of Texas at Austin to begin work toward a doctoral degree.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, he joined the U.S. Navy and served in the Pacific area as a Medical Laboratory Technician with a specialty in Parasitology. He was Chief Pharmacist's Mate when he returned to the U.S. mainland where, during a short leave of absence, he married Edna Cronquist, graduate student in Botany at the University of Texas. On return to duty he taught Malariology at the School of Tropical Medicine at Treasure Island, California.

He was commissioned Ensign and sent to Florida as mosquito control officer at the Boca Chica Naval Air Station. Near the end of WWII he retired from the Navy with the rank of Lieutenant (j.g.). After the war he re-entered the University of Texas and was awarded a Ph.D. degree in Zoology (Genetics) in 1947. He joined the Zoology faculty as Instructor and retired in 1977 as Professor of Zoology, Emeritus.

Dr. Wheeler enjoyed teaching and received numerous teaching awards during his tenure at UT. He also participated in various research projects involving the small fruitfly, Drosophila. He organized the "National Drosophila Species Resource Center" in which about 300 different species were kept in culture for use by researchers at UT and around the world.

Supported by grants from The National Science Foundation, The National Institutes of Health, The Atomic Energy Commission and others, he collected specimens in the U.S. and Central and South America, Japan and Pacific Islands, that are now housed in the National Museum of Natural History, Washington, DC (a part of the Smithsonian Institute), and the American Museum of Natural History, New York City.

Of special note was his work in the Marshall Islands to determine the genetic effects of radiation on natural populations, in collaboration with his colleague Wilson Stone, PhD.

Dr. Wheeler was best known as a taxonomist of insects world-wide, specifically those of the family Drosophilidae. He authored or co-authored over 100 scientific articles in which he named and described more than 250 new species of Drosophila and related families. Eight species were named for him, including one fossil species. His friend Bill Baker wrote in 1993, "It must be a great satisfaction to be known as the world's authority on some field of science."

Dr. Wheeler served as President of the Southwestern Association of Naturalists and of the Southwestern Entomological Society, had been an editor of the Annals of the Entomological Society of America, and Studies in Genetics published by the Genetics Foundation of the University of Texas. He was listed in Who's Who in America, American Men of Science, and other similar publications. He was a member of The Wilderness Society, the Nature Conservancy, Audubon Society, and other organizations.

He held the belief that all efforts to preserve our natural world were worth supporting. After his retirement he pursued his hobby-- growing and hybridizing daylilies in pursuit of the elusive blue daylily.

In 1993 he published his autobiography, 'Looking Back', his family genealogical research in Our Wheeler Family (1997), and a short paperback novel describing the coming of age of "Danny", a teenage boy, in 1999.

Dr. Wheeler is survived by his ex-wife, Linda Lackner Wheeler, PhD; a daughter, Karen Wheeler, DVM; and by a son, Carson L. Wheeler, AAS, all of the Austin area; and by a daughter and son-in-law, Rev. Sandra and Mark Heu, of Honolulu, Hawaii. Also by two sisters: Lois Sanders, widow of Charles Sanders of Perryville, MO; and Roberta Lindahl, widow of Donald Lindahl of Morganton, NC; and several cousins, nephews and nieces.

A memorial service will be held Friday, January 8 at 4:00 p.m. at the Embassy Suites Austin Central, 5901 North Interstate 35 in Austin. In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made in his honor to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, 4801 La Crosse Avenue, Austin, TX 78739. www.wildflower.org Special thanks to the staff at St. David's Medical Center.

Published in Austin American-Statesman from January 6 to January 7, 2010