Old Photograph Glenernie Cottage Forres Scotland

Old photograph of Glenernie cottage on Tolbooth Street in Forres, Moray, Scotland. Hugh Falconer was born, the youngest son of David Falconer, in Forres, on 29 February 1808. He was a Scottish geologist, botanist, palaeontologist, and paleoanthropologist. He studied the flora, fauna, and geology of India, Assam, and Burma, and was the first to suggest the modern evolutionary theory of punctuated equilibrium. He was the first to discover the Siwalik fossil beds, and may also have been the first person to discover a fossil ape. In 1826 Hugh Falconer graduated at the University of Aberdeen, where he studied natural history. Afterward, he studied medicine in the University of Edinburgh, taking the degree of MD in 1829. He became an assistant surgeon on the Bengal establishment of the British East India Company in 1830. In 1847 Falconer became superintendent of the Calcutta Botanical Garden and professor of botany in the Medical College, Calcutta, near his older brother, Alexander Falconer, a Calcutta merchant. He served as vice president of the Royal Society between 1863 and 1864. Although suffering from exposure and overwork, Falconer returned hastily from a trip to Gibraltar to support Charles Darwin's claim to the Copley Medal in 1864. Falconer succumbed in London, England, on 31 January 1865, from rheumatic disease of the heart and lungs. He is buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, London, England.



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