Thomas Bolton (1831âÂÂ1887) was an English businessman, zoologist, and microscopist, who specialised in collecting and supplying specimens, especially living rotifers and other infusoria, to other microscopists by post, from his business in Birmingham, England. He discovered and described several putative new species, although his descriptions are not now recognised under the rules of formal zoological taxonomy. A number of leading contemporary scientists acknowledged his work and some named species after him. His scientific contributions were also recognised by the award of a civil list pension, at the behest of leading scientists.
Bolton was born in 1831 at Kinver, South Staffordshire, and baptised at St. Peter's Church, Kinver, on 7 September that year. He was the son of another Thomas Bolton (1796âÂÂ1851), an iron master and partner in the firm of Lee and Bolton, who owned Hyde Iron Works, and of Thomas' wife Elizabeth, née Perry.
He was educated at Kinver Grammar School, and then at King's College, London. He passed the 1851 matriculation examination to enter London University, gaining honours in mathematics and natural philosophy, with a view to studying as an engineer. However, the death of his father in October 1851 necessitated his return to Kinver and entry into the business.
He married Julia Charlotte (née Turner) on 15 August 1860 at St. Mary, Stoke Newington, Hackney, London.
Bolton was active in local community work, especially in regard to education, He was instrumental in the establishment of the area's first board school, set up and managed evening classes, and became governor of Kinver Grammar School (a role he maintained until his death). He also assisted the local Young Men's Mutual Improvement Society, and served as churchwarden. In 1867 he was an exam board secretary for the Society of Arts. At that time and into the mid 1870s he gave his address as Hyde House, Kinver, and wrote about collecting specimens in "Hyde Pool".
In August 1868, Bolton and his business partners Thomas Yate Lee and John Francis Lee, trading as Lee and Bolton, were declared bankrupt. The iron works taken over, under the same business name, by H. O. Firmstone of Crookhay Ironworks, West Bromwich, by whom Bolton was employed as works manager. In around 1878, the business again collapsed, and Bolton, having already lost his fortune and his personal property, found himself unemployed.
In 1878, following his financial losses, Bolton set up business as the "Microscopist's and Naturalists' Studio" at 17, Ann Street, Birmingham. A piece in The Midland Naturalist later that year said:
Some time around the turn of 1880âÂÂ1881, the business moved nearby, to 57, Newhall Street, Birmingham. A note in The Northern Microscopist described his premises thus:
As well as amateur naturalists, he supplied schools, colleges and museums. Thanks to an efficient postal service he was able to supply clients as far away as Paris and, later, the United States The former included Jules Pelletan, editor of the .
Along with the specimens, he provided a "flyleaf"âÂÂa sheet of instructions on preparing the specimens and notes on key features to observe. Some of these he wrote himself and some he extracted from published articles. They included illustrations commissioned, from 1879 to 1882, from , or from William Saville-Kent. The flyleavesâÂÂincluding illustrations and hand-written textsâÂÂwere initially reproduced using autographic printing, a process which Bolton also promoted from his business premises on behalf of its inventor, Alfred Pumphrey, a Birmingham photographer, although some of the flyleaves were also typeset and printed in a more traditional manner.
In addition to his business, Bolton corresponded with and supplied specimens to scientists including Francis Alfred Bedwell, Philip Henry Gosse, Charles Thomas Hudson, Ray Lankester and Saville-Kent. In 1879 Lankester wrote a glowing recommendation of "Mr. Bolton's Agency for the Supply of Microscopic Organisms" in the Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science, of which he was editor. Bolton replied by way of a letter in Nature, modestly refuting some of the discoveries which Lankester incorrectly attributed to him.
Bolton collected and sometimes described the type specimens of several species then thought new to science, although at least some of these have since been described as junior synonyms of already-known species. These included Floscularia mutabilis, but his description of the species, in a self-published flyleaf, was later declared invalid and attributed, with the same name, to Hudson, who had subsequently published a more formal description.
Similarly, Hudson attributed Conochilus dossuarius and Pompholyx sulcata to Bolton, who discovered them, but subsequent authorities have attributed them to Hudson. He also mentions "Stephanops bifurcus Bolton", in a list of Stephanops species; and credits Bolton with the discovery (but not description or naming) of Notommata spicata and Taphrocampa saundersiae. Hudson further noted:
Lankester named Archerina boltoni after Bolton from a specimen that the latter had collected and supplied to him.
In 1878, Bolton wrote that a specimen he had collected was a new species, and had been named Chætospira cylindrica by Saville-Kent, but in 1885 Saville-Kent stated that the name was provisional, and the species had already been named Stichotricha remex by Hudson.
Furcularia boltoni, whose type specimen Bolton collected, was named in his honour by Gosse, who wrote:
but it was later found to be an "unavailable name" as the type specimen was not deposited in a known collection.
Edward Collins Bousfield credited Bolton with finding the type specimen of Dero mulleri.
Saville-Kent named Salpingoeca boltoni and Folliculina boltoni in his "A Manual of the Infusoria" (1880âÂÂ1882), the preface of which thanks Bolton for supplying specimens.
Bolton served for several years as a secretary to the Dudley and Midland Geological and Scientific Society, and was active in the Birmingham Natural History and Microscopical Society, holding the post of curator from 1884. During the ten-week-long 1886 British Association exhibition at Bingley Hall in Birmingham, he served as the permanent attendant in the natural history annexe.
He wrote for a number of publications, including The Midland Naturalist and The English Mechanic and World of Science. A series of articles from the latter was reprinted as a pamphlet, "Hints on the Preservation of Living Objects and Their Examination Under the Microscope" (1879).
He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Microscopical Society (FRMS) in 1878. His exhibit at the 1883 International Fisheries Exhibition earned him a gold medal.
In 1886, at the instigation of and (son of Thomas Yate Lee), who petitioned the government, Bolton was awarded a civil list pension of ã50 per year, in recognition of his contributions to science. Among those who signed the petition were sixteen Fellows of the Royal Society (one also an MP), a further twelve professors, and the mayors of Birmingham and Sutton Coldfield.
In the 1881 census, Bolton's residential address was given as 108 Hall Road, Handsworth, Staffordshire.
Bolton died on 7 November 1887 at Sampson Road, Birmingham, aged 56. His funeral took place at St. Peter's Church, Kinver, on 11 November, with his coffin born by his former iron works employees. He was interred in his family's vault. A five-page obituary was published in The Midland Naturalist, with another in the Birmingham Daily Post. His wife survived him.
The microscopy business was carried on by the eldest of Bolton's sons, Thomas Edward Bolton (also FRMS), (to whom Bolton bequeathed all his equipment and books) working from 83, Camden Street, and boasting in an 1889 advertisement of the fisheries exhibition gold medal, and eventually from premises at 25, Balsall Health Road, in the Edgbaston district of Birmingham. Advertisements using the latter address appeared in Nature until at least as late as 30 April 1908.