[1] Frederick Bayer was born on Halloween night 1921,[2] in Asbury Park, New Jersey,[1] but spent much of his childhood in South Florida, where he collected seashells and became an amateur naturalist.
[1] While in the military, he often sketched and collected fish, shells and butterflies throughout New Guinea, the Philippines, and Okinawa.
He served as a professor at the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science between 1961 and 1975.
While at the University of Miami, Bayer participated in a number of soft coral-collecting expeditions in the Caribbean Sea and in the waters off West Africa.
[1] Japan's Emperor Hirohito, who was also a marine biologist, actually named a hydroid, Hydractinia bayeri, in honor of Frederick Bayer.