Hermon Carey Bumpus was born in Buckfield, Maine in 1862 and received a Ph.B.
Bumpus joined the faculty of Brown as a professor of comparative zoology in 1890, where he emphasized active experimentation over the "didactic doldrums" of lectures.
[2] In 1893, Bumpus worked with colleagues Charles V. Chapin and John Howard Appleton in establishing a premedical program, one of the first premedical programs in the United States, with Bumpus as the director.
[2] His comparison of house sparrows that survived an uncommonly severe storm in 1898 with those that did not, including their respective measurements, has been cited as a classic example of natural selection in action.
[3] Bumpus received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Brown University in 1905.