John Ramsbottom (mycologist)

John Ramsbottom (mycologist)

John Ramsbottom (1885–1974) was a British mycologist.

He was Keeper of Botany at the British Museum (Natural History). He served as general secretary and twice as president of the British Mycological Society, and was long editor of its Transactions. He was president of the Linnean Society from 1937 to 1940 and was awarded their Linnean Medal in 1965. Dr Ramsbottom was President of the Society for the History of Natural History from 1943-1972. He was made an Honorary Member in 1972. Dr Ramsbottom made a bequest to the Society in his will and it was decided to utilise this to establish The Ramsbottom Lecture, to be given at the Society’s International Meetings, the first being delivered in April 1976.

"In reading the old accounts one finds a strange mixture of fact and fantasy. Some are so fantastic that if they had not been accepted by other authors they would not find a place in even a most detailed historical summary. Then there comes an observation of such merit that all seems set for real progress. But these facts, even when accepted, are often misinterpreted, almost as if in a superfluity of naughtiness, and again there is confusion." – John Ramsbottom, Mushrooms & Toadstools, 1953, p. 17