George Richard Vasey (1853–1921) was an American plant collector who collected in at least nine U.S. states including California, North Carolina, and Washington.
Based on the number of his specimens described as new species, the historian Joseph Ewan remarked "he must have had a hawk eye for plant prey".
The precise place and date of his birth are unknown but records from the United States census of 1900 suggest he was born in Illinois in August 1853.
[3][4] Following their marriage in 1846, his parents settled in Dexter, New York but by the time Vasey was born, the family lived in Ringwood, Illinois where his father practiced medicine.
In 1882, when Washington was still a territory, he bought some land near Steptoe,[7] which is approximately 40 miles south of what is now Spokane.
Based on the number of specimens subsequently described as new species, "he must have had a hawk eye for plant prey".
Many of G. R. Vasey's specimens were sent to his father, who at the time was curator of the United States National Herbarium (US).
The American botanist Sereno Watson cited more than a dozen of Vasey's specimens in the Botany of California published in 1880.
[8] Based on the herbarium record, he visited North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, in that order.
Based on herbarium records, G. R. Vasey collected thousands of plant specimens in the Southwestern United States in 1880 and 1881.
[19] In 1881, he collected hundreds of specimens in Southern California, Arizona, Texas, and New Mexico, in that order.
The American botanist Charles Vancouver Piper compiled a taxonomic summary of Vasey's specimens in 1936.
There are dozens of eponymous taxon names that include an epithet such as vaseyi, vaseyanus, vaseyana, or vaseyanum.
[32] In his description, Harbison claimed that "this Trillium was collected in the mountains of North Carolina in 1878 by Dr. George Vasey, whose name I take pleasure in associating with this species".