Bashford Dean

Who was Bashford Dean?

Bashford Dean was an American zoologist, specializing in ichthyology, and at the same time an expert in medieval armor. He is the only person to have held concurrent positions at the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he was Honorary Curator of Arms and Armor; the Metropolitan Museum purchased his collection of arms and armor after his death, which his friend Daniel Chester French commemorated with a plaque.

Dean was born on October 28, 1867 in New York City. He graduated in 1886 from the College of the City of New York, and in 1890 received his Ph.D from Columbia University, where he was an assistant for Professor John Strong Newberry and later became a professor of zoology. His studies with Newberry of the Devonian armored fishes eventually resulted in Dean's "Studies on fossil fishes