a story lives forever
Register
Sign in
Form submission failed!

Stay signed in

Recover your password?
Register
Form submission failed!

Web of Stories Ltd would like to keep you informed about our products and services.

Please tick here if you would like us to keep you informed about our products and services.

I have read and accepted the Terms & Conditions.

Please note: Your email and any private information provided at registration will not be passed on to other individuals or organisations without your specific approval.

Video URL

You must be registered to use this feature. Sign in or register.

NEXT STORY

The pros and cons of living in Tenafly, New Jersey

RELATED STORIES

Getting married, having children and moving house
Ernst Mayr Scientist
Comments (0) Please sign in or register to add comments

I had met my wife also in International House, because she was an exchange student at Wheaton College, and we continued our courtship by correspondence and I finally married her in May 1935 in Freiberg, Germany, which was her home town. And then we moved into Upper Manhattan, a small apartment where our first child was born, and then we decided that the children – and we would hope to have another child – the children should grow up somewhere in a suburb and not on Manhattan. And we got ourselves a house in Tenafly, New Jersey, and getting that house was really quite funny because the real estate agent asked, 'Now, how much money have you saved up for the down payment? And what is your salary? How much can you pay per month and in... for the mortgage?' and so forth. And after he got all that information he said, 'Well, then we have to go to the part of Tenafly where the $8000 houses are'. And so we went to the part of Tenafly with the $8000 houses and there was indeed another college professor - a professor of psychology in NYU [New York University] who became one of our closest friends; but the other neighbours were all people that could afford an $8000 house. One was an... an electrician, fine mechanic working for Bell Telephone, another one was a... on... paper salesman, another was a plumbing salesman, and so on and so forth.

The late German-American biologist Ernst Mayr (1904-2005) was a leading light in the field of evolutionary biology, gaining a PhD at the age of 21. He was also a tropical explorer and ornithologist who undertook an expedition to New Guinea and collected several thousand bird skins. In 1931 he accepted a curatorial position at the American Museum of Natural History. During his time at the museum, aged 37, he published his seminal work 'Systematics and Origin of the Species' which integrated the theories of Darwin and Mendel and is considered one of his greatest works.

Listeners: Walter J. Bock

Walter J. Bock is Professor of Evolutionary Biology at Columbia University. He received his B.Sc. from Cornell and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard. His research lies in the areas of organismal and evolutionary biology, with a special emphasis on functional and evolutionary morphology of the skeleto-muscular system, specifically the feeding apparatus of birds.

Tags: New York, International House, New York, Wheaton College, 05-1935, Freiberg, Germany, Upper Manhattan, Tenafly, New Jersey

Duration: 1 minute, 45 seconds

Date story recorded: October 1997

Date story went live: 24 January 2008