Daniel Giraud Elliot

Who was Daniel Giraud Elliot?

Daniel Giraud Elliot was an American zoologist.

Elliot was one of the founders of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, of the American Ornithologists' Union and of the Société zoologique de France. He was also curator of zoology at the Field Museum in Chicago.

Elliot used his wealth to publish a series of sumptuous color-plate books on birds and animals. Elliot wrote the text himself and commissioned artists such as Joseph Wolf and Joseph Smit, both of whom had worked for John Gould, to provide the illustrations. The books included A Monograph of the Phasianidae, A Monograph of the Paradiseidae or Birds of Paradise, A Monograph of the Felidae or Family of Cats and Review of the Primates.

In 1899, Elliot was invited to join the elite Harriman Alaska Expedition to study and document wildlife along the Alaskan coast.

The National Academy of Sciences awards the Daniel Giraud Elliot medal "for meritorious work in zoology or paleontology published in a three- to five-year period. Established through the Daniel Giraud Elliot Fund by gift of Miss Margaret Henderson Elliot."