William Gambel was an American naturalist, ornithologist, and botanist from Philadelphia.
18 Facts About William Gambel
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In 1838 William Gambel met the renowned naturalist Thomas Nuttall, and they quickly became friends.
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Nuttall had a broad expertise in all aspects of natural history, and through his influence, William Gambel developed an affinity for botany, mineralogy, and ornithology.
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In October 1839, they were back in Philadelphia to attend a meeting of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, where William Gambel presented a gold nugget from North Carolina for the museum collection.
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In February 1840, William Gambel accompanied Nuttall to Cambridge, Massachusetts where Nuttall had been invited to present a series of lectures at the Lowell Institute.
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In March 1841, at the age of eighteen, William Gambel set off on his own for California to collect plants and other specimens for Nuttall.
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William Gambel planned to take a more southerly route than that taken in 1834 by Nuttall and John Kirk Townsend.
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Thomas Nuttall 8.
In September, William Gambel joined a party heading to California and accompanied them along the Old Spanish Trail, arriving in Mexican Alta California in early November 1841, becoming the first botanist to enter California overland from the east.
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William Gambel spent the next year collecting along the coast from Los Angeles up to Monterey.
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William Gambel later published his observations in Remarks on birds observed in Upper California, with descriptions of new species.
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In Philadelphia, William Gambel published some of his zoological findings and sent many of his botanical specimens to Nuttall for publication.
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In 1845, William Gambel entered the medical school at the University of Pennsylvania and received a medical degree in March 1848.
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William Gambel served briefly as the Recording Secretary at the Academy of Natural Sciences.
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William Gambel soon encountered difficulty in establishing a medical practice in Philadelphia.
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William Gambel shipped his medical books and equipment by sea and made arrangements for his wife to join him after he became settled.
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However, William Gambel grew tired of the group's fast pace and joined a slower-moving ox-train led by Captain Boone of Kentucky.
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William Gambel tried to treat the ill miners, but he became sick himself and died December 13,1849.
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William Gambel was buried at the base of a giant ponderosa pine, but the entire site was washed away by hydraulic mining.