Henry Suter

Dr Henry Suter (born Hans Heinrich Suter) (9 March 1841 - 1918) was a New Zealand zoologist, naturalist and palaeontologist, a major influence in the study and classification of New Zealand molluscs through the first half of the twentieth century.

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Early life

Henry Suter was born on 9 March 1841 at Riesbach, Zürich, Switzerland, the son of Heinrich Suter, a silk manufacturer, and his wife, Susanna Mahler. He became an analytical chemist in Zürich and joined his father's silk manufacturing firm. On 1 October 1867 he married Barbara Julia Ida Naef at Altstetten, Zürich. The couple were to have 10 children, seven of whom survived childhood. The silk manufacturing business failed about 1885, and Suter emigrated to New Zealand with their seven children.

The Suter family arrived in New Zealand in January 1887. After deciding that forest clearing and farming was beyond him, in November 1888 he became assistant manager at the Hermitage, Mt Cook, a temporary position arranged through the scientist F. W. Hutton. Suter collected the highly diverse fauna of tiny forest snails, and in 1890 he published the first of many papers describing new species of snails. This established his credentials with the New Zealand scientific community.

Publishing of his Manual

Initially restricting his studies to forest and freshwater snails in New Zealand and to related snails in Brazil, Africa and Tasmania, he later concentrated on the marine molluscs of New Zealand. After being naturalised in 1890, he lived in Auckland from around 1900 to 1910 and in Christchurch from 1911.

Many years work resulted in the publication of Suter's monumental Manual of the New Zealand Mollusca in 1913, with an atlas of plates in 1915, which had an enormous influence on Australasian molluscan taxonomy. It was to be another 56 years before Powell's landmark New Zealand Mollusca: marine, land and freshwater shells was published.

Later years

Suter spent the last five years of his life identifying and describing Cenozoic fossil shells for the New Zealand Geological Survey.

Henry Suter died in Christchurch on 31 July 1918, aged 77. Ida Suter had died in 1910. His collections made their way to various institutions:

• his small but important collection of snails, marine shells and fossils, are with the Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences,
• his manuscript catalogues and bound volumes of reprints are also with the Institute of Geological and Nuclear Sciences,
• his non-marine shells are in the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington,
• his collection of European land and freshwater shells from his European period is in the Australian Museum in Sydney.

References

• Powell A W B, New Zealand Mollusca, William Collins Publishers Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand 1979 ISBN 0-00-216906-1
• Beu, A. G. 'Suter, Henry 1841 - 1918'. Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, updated 22 June 2007 URL: http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/

Bibliography

• Manual of the New Zealand Mollusca 1913