{{Short description|English mycologist (1844–1916)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}} {{Infobox scientist | name = Charles Crossland | image = Charles Crossland (2).jpg | birth_date = {{Birth date|1844|9|3|df=y}} | birth_place = Halifax, Yorkshire | death_date = {{Death date and age|1916|12|9|1844|9|3|df=yes}} | death_place = Halifax, Yorkshire | field = Mycology | known_for = Contributions to taxonomic mycology | author_abbreviation_bot = Crossl. }}
'''Charles Crossland''' (3 September 1844 – 9 December 1916) was an English mycologist.
==Background and career== Charles Crossland was born in Halifax, Yorkshire. His parents ran a general store and Charles left school at 13 to help them run the business. He trained as a butcher and opened a shop in Wyke in 1864, the same year he married Mary Ann Cragg. The couple had four children, two dying in infancy, and Mary Ann herself died in 1869. Charles remarried in 1871 and had two children by his second wife, Clementina Foster. In 1873, the couple returned to Halifax, where they opened a butcher's shop which they continued to run till Charles largely retired from the trade (leaving the shop mostly in the hands of a managing partner) in 1890. He was treasurer of the Halifax Butchers' Association from 1881 to 1908 and often referred to himself as a "Knight of the Cleaver".<ref name="Obit1917"/><ref name="Bull2011"/>
He spoke and was interested in the local Halifax dialect, publishing a number of papers on local place-names and surnames in the ''Transactions of the Yorkshire Dialect Society'', of which he was a member, eventually becoming the society's president. In later years, he also compiled a bibliography of Halifax, parts of which were published in the ''Transactions of the Halifax Antiquarian Society'', as well as a local guide book, ''Pleasant walks around Halifax'' (1910).<ref name="Naturalist1910"/>
He died in Halifax on 9 December 1916.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/42888910/mr_charles_crossland/ |title=Mr. Charles Crossland |work=The Guardian |page=12 |date=1916-12-12 |access-date=2020-01-23 |via=Newspapers.com}}</ref>
==Mycology== Crossland initially became interested in botany in 1880, whilst helping one of his daughters with a Sunday school wild flower project. He joined the Halifax Scientific Society to pursue his new-found enthusiasm, and subsequently the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union. In 1888, at a YNU fungus foray, Crossland met George Edward Massee who encouraged him to take an interest in fungi.<ref name="ObitNaturalist"/> As a result, he developed an expertise in mycology, with a particular interest in the discomycetes, making extensive local collections, often in the company of Henry Thomas Soppitt and fellow mycologist and bryologist James Needham.<ref name="Naturalist1910"/> Crossland produced many papers on Yorkshire fungi, including several describing species new to science. His two major works were the cryptogamic section of the ''Flora of the parish of Halifax'', jointly authored with botanist W.B. Crump in 1904, and ''The Fungus Flora of Yorkshire'', a substantial volume co-authored with Massee, in 1905.<ref name="Obit1917"/><ref name="Naturalist1910"/><ref name="ObitNaturalist"/> His collections of fungi, drawings, and notes are now in the mycological herbarium at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.<ref name="ObitKew"/><ref name="Ainsworth1996"/>
Charles Crossland became the first secretary of the Yorkshire Naturalists' Union Mycological Committee in 1892, becoming president of the union itself in 1907. He was a founder member of the British Mycological Society, becoming its first treasurer in 1896. He was made a fellow of the Linnean Society in 1899.<ref name="Naturalist1910"/>
==Taxa== Crossland described several new species of fungi from Yorkshire, either individually or with Soppitt or Massee. These included several agarics, notably ''Lactarius glaucescens'' Crossl., but were mostly discomycetes, including ''Ascophanus globosopulvinatus'' (Crossl.) Boud. ex Ramsb., ''Niptera pilosa'' (Crossl.) Boud., ''Melastiza contorta'' (Massee & Crossl.) Spooner & Y.J. Yao, and ''Scutellinia citrina'' (Massee & Crossl.) Spooner & Y.J. Yao. A number of species were named in Crossland's honour, including ''Clavaria crosslandii'' Cotton, ''Ascobolus crosslandii'' Boud., and ''Octospora crosslandii'' (Dennis & Itzerott) Benkert.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.indexfungorum.org/Names/Names.asp|title = Index Fungorum - Search Page}}</ref>
==Selected publications== *Crossland, C. (1892). New and rare fungi near Halifax. ''The Naturalist'' 1892: 371–372 *Crossland, C. (1899). ''Mollisia cinerea'' and its varieties. ''Transactions of the British Mycological Society'' 1: 106–109. *Crump, W.B. & Crossland, C. (1904). ''The flora of the parish of Halifax''. Halifax Scientific Society https://archive.org/stream/floraofparishofh1904crum#page/n5/mode/2up *Massee. G. & Crossland, C. (1905). ''The fungus flora of Yorkshire''. London: A. Brown https://archive.org/stream/fungusfloraofyor00mass#page/n0/mode/2up {{Clear}} {{botanist|Crossl.}}
== References == {{reflist|2|refs=
<ref name="Ainsworth1996">{{cite book |author=Ainsworth, GC. |title=Brief biographies of British mycologists |publisher=British Mycological Society |location=Stourbridge |year=1996 }}</ref>
<ref name="Naturalist1910">{{cite journal |author=Sheppard, T. |year=1910 |title=Prominent Yorkshire Workers: IV. C. Crossland, FLS |journal=The Naturalist |volume=645 |pages=367–374 }}</ref>
<ref name="Obit1917">{{cite journal |author=Ramsbottom, J. |year=1917 |title=Charles Crossland (1844-1916) |journal=Transactions of the British Mycological Society |volume=5 |pages=466–469 |doi=10.1016/s0007-1536(14)80049-1|url=https://zenodo.org/record/1428496 |doi-access=free }}</ref>
<ref name="Bull2011">M. Bull, ''Calderdale Companion'' http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~calderdalecompanion/mmc277.html</ref>
<ref name="ObitNaturalist">{{cite journal |author=Sheppard, T. |year=1917 |title=In memoriam: Charles Crossland |journal=The Naturalist |volume=720 |pages=24–26 }}</ref>
<ref name="ObitKew">{{cite journal |author=Cotton, A.D. |year=1917 |title=Charles Crossland |journal=Kew Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information |volume=1 |issue=1 |pages=36–37 }}</ref> }}
==External links== {{Commons category-inline}}
* {{cite news |title=Well known scientist's death, Mr Charles Crossland, Halifax |url=https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0001940/19161215/057/0003 |access-date=14 May 2021 |work=Todmorden & District News |agency=British Newspaper Archive |url-access=subscription |date=15 December 1916 |page=3 col.4}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Crossland, Charles}} Category:1844 births Category:1916 deaths Category:19th-century British biologists Category:British Mycological Society Category:English mycologists Category:Fellows of the Linnean Society of London Category:19th-century English botanists Category:20th-century English botanists Category:People from Halifax, West Yorkshire