Haacke, Johann Wilhelm   (1855 - 1912)

Born in Clenze, Lower Saxony 23 August 1855 ; died in Luneburg 6 December 1912.

He gained his doctorate in zoology in 1878 from the University of Jena. He was then employed at the Zoological Institute of the University of Jena followed by employment at the Zoological Institute at the University of Kiel.

He migrated to New Zealand in 1881 where he was first engaged by Professor Parker at the Otago Museum, Dunedin, and then by Dr. Julius Haast at the Canterbury Museum, Christchurch.

In 1882 he was initially appointed as the Acting Curator (March 22nd) of the South Australian Museum while the first curator, Frederick George Waterhouse, was on leave. He was subsequently appointed Curator (November 3rd) with a later change of title to Director (February 2nd 1883).

He held the Director's position until November 1st 1884 when, partly because of criticism by the public that too many of the South Australian collections were being sent overseas, he offered his resignation. This was to take effect following 6 months paid leave which he apparently spent in South Australia studying jellyfishes.

Following his 6 months leave he was appointed as the chief scientist on the New Guinea Exploration Expedition, also referred to as the Bonito expedition, organised by the NSW branch of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia. This expedition to the Fly River area, under the leadership of Henry Charles Everill, lasted from June to December 1885, and at one stage it was reported in the Australian newspapers (erroneously) that the whole party had been massacred. The botanist on this expedition was William Bauerlen.

Returning to Adelaide after the expedition he gave several accounts to the newspapers and he gave a number of lectures on evolution at the Freethought Lecture Hall in the first half of 1886.

He appears to have departed for Germany in September 1886 where he had been asked to represent South Australia at a colonisation conference in Berlin.

He travelled and lectured around Germany and was from May 1888 to April 1893 director of the Zoological Gardens, Frankfurt, during which time he completed a second thesis at the Technische Universität, Darmstadt. He moved to Darmstadt and spent much of his time as an independent scholar when a hoped-for professorship did not result.

Source: Extracted from: Robyn Barker (2019) 'Nothing changes - early taxonomic difficulties and suggestions for a concerted approach to the documentation of Australian flora, fauna and geology', Australasian Systematic Botany Society Newsletter 180 (September 2019) p.6-11
Portrait Photo: Extracted from above, from State Library of South Australia, (B 22154).