Born in Frederick, Maryland, on 16 April 1868, Alfred Goldsborough Mayer (spelling changed to Mayor in 1918) was the son of Alfred Marshall Mayer, a noted American physicist. Although an excellent student of mathematics and physics, young Alfred preferred zoology as his field of study. However, as his strong-minded father wanted his son to pursue a career in the physical sciences, Alfred majored in engineering at the Stevens Institute of Technology, in Hoboken, New Jersey, from which he graduated in 1889. He began advanced work in physics soon thereafter, but decided to enter the graduate program in zoology at Harvard University in 1892, where he came to the attention of Alexander Agassiz, a prominent marine zoologist and director of Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ). Agassiz soon placed Mayor in charge of the MCZ’s division of coelenterates and other radiate species.
Mayor collected specimens for the MCZ in various locations on the east coast of America and around the Dry...
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Stephens, L. D., and Calder, D. R., 2006. Seafaring Scientist: Alfred Goldsborough Mayor, Pioneer in Marine Biology. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.
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Stephens, L.D. (2011). Mayor, Alfred Goldsborough (1868–1922). In: Hopley, D. (eds) Encyclopedia of Modern Coral Reefs. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-2639-2_230
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