Ames, Oakes (1804–1873)

US capitalist and representative. At the death of his father, Oliver Ames, Oakes and his brother took control of the family shovel factory. Oakes went on to become a Republican representative in 1863, and in 1865 he began his involvement with the financiers, Crédit Mobilier. In the early 1870s he was investigated for selling Crédit Mobilier railroad stock to congressmen.

Ames, Oakes (1874–1950)

US botanist. He taught and performed research at Harvard (1898–1941). In 1900 he was instrumental in founding Harvard's Atkins Garden in Cuba. His skilled administration (1937–45) brought Harvard's Botanical Museum to prominence. He amassed a large collection of orchid specimens, his specialty, and made major contributions to studies of their taxonomy and evolution. A pioneer in economic botany, he devised the Ames charts in which plant families were pictured and identified by their economic products. His theory (1930s) that civilization was directly dependent on agriculture – eventually supported by archaeological findings – was summed up in his masterwork, Economic Annuals and Human Culture (1939).