Grinnell, George Bird [key], 1849–1938, American naturalist and student of Native American life, b. Brooklyn, N.Y., grad. Yale (B.A., 1870; Ph.D., 1880). He accompanied Custer's Black Hills expedition as naturalist (1874), was with William Ludlow's expedition to Yellowstone Park (1875), and was a member of the Harriman Alaska expedition in 1899. He was editor (1876–1911) of Forest and Stream and was prominent in preservation of wildlife and in conservation movements. He organized the first Audubon Society and was an organizer of the New York Zoological Society. In 1885 he discovered the glacier in Montana that now bears his name and was influential in legislation that led to the establishment (1910) of Glacier National Park. He is best known, however, for his books on the Plains culture area, such as Pawnee Hero Stories (1889), The Story of the Indian (1895), The Fighting Cheyennes (1915), and The Cheyenne Indians (1923).
See his selected papers ed. by J. F. Reiger (1972); biography by J. Taliaferro (2019).
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