Howard A. Crum, professor of botany in the Department of Biology and curator of bryophytes and lichens in the Herbarium, will retire from active faculty status on August 31, 1995.

Professor Crum received his B.S. degree magna cum laude from Western Michigan College in 1947 and his M.S. (1949) and Ph.D. (1951) degrees from the University of Michigan. He served as curator of cryptograms in the National Museum of Canada from 1954-65, when he joined the faculty at the University of Michigan as associate professor of botany and curator of bryophytes. He was promoted to professor in 1969, served as chair of the Department of Botany from 1981-83, and was editor of The Michigan Botanist from 1977-84.

Professor Crum is widely considered one of this century's foremost authorities on the taxonomy and phytogeography of mosses. With L. E. Anderson, he published Mosses of Eastern North America, which received the H. A. Gleason Award from the New York Botanical Garden in 1981. Other major floristic works that he authored or co-authored have treated the mosses of the Great Lakes forest, Puerto Rico, and Mexico, and the genus Sphagnum in North America. A steady stream of over 230 papers in journals continues unabated. Professor Crum also served bryology as editor or associate editor of The Bryologist from 1954-76 and as president of the American Bryological and Lichenological Society from 1962-63. His doctoral students occupy important bryological positions in three nations, and practically every bryologist in the United States and Canada has taken his famous course at the University of Michigan Biological Station. For his achievements as a teacher at the Biological Station, he earned an Excellence in Education Award from the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts in 1993. Since 1973, Professor Crum has also served as an academic counselor for the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts. His friendly curiosity, wry humor, and warm and supportive manner earned him the Ruth M. Sinclair Memorial Award for Freshman-Sophomore Counseling in 1978.

The University of Michigan Herbarium has long had one of the hemisphere's largest and most important collections of bryophytes and lichens. Under Professor Crum's curation, those collections have been reorganized, greatly enlarged, and extensively studied.

The Regents now salute this distinguished teacher and scholar by naming Howard A. Crum professor emeritus of botany and curator emeritus of bryophytes and lichens.