(3 March 1917 – 27 March 2000)1
Information compiled in 2017 by Carol Ann McCormick,Curatrix of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Herbarium. Special thanks to Nicole Wallace, Alumni Records, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
The University of North Carolina Herbarium at Chapel Hill (NCU) has found about a half a dozen vascular plant specimens collected by Hiden T. Cox, Jr. He frequently collected with fellow student James Arthur Doubles, Jr. and Professor Dr. William Chambers Coker. All Cox’s vascular plant specimens curated by NCU were collected in South Carolina. NCU curates four fungal specimens collected by Cox. All were collected in August, 1939 in Highlands, Macon County, NC. It is highly likely that Cox was studying at the Highlands Biological Station in Highlands, NC when he collected these fungi.
Hiden Toy Cox, Jr. was born in Greenville, South Carolina on 3 March, 1917. His mother was Lenora Elizabeth Hough Cox, and his father was Hiden Toy Cox, a professor of Physics at Furman University in Greenville.1,4
He earned his undergraduate degree from Furman University in 1937, then came to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to study mycology with Dr. John Nathaniel Couch for a Masters Degree. The title of his M.A. thesis in 1939 was “A new genus of the Rhizidiaceae.” He continued at Carolina for his doctorate, studying with Dr. Joseph Edison Adams. The title of his doctoral thesis in 1947 was “The comparative anatomy of the Ericaceae.”
Cox was an Associate Professor of Botany at Agnes Scott College in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia, in 1946, then was an Associate Professor of Biology at Virginia Polytechnic Institute in Blacksburg, Virginia in 1949. He also taught at Howard University, a private, historically Black research university in Washington, D.C. In the 1950’s he served on the Governing Board of the American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS), and in 1955 became that organization’s Executive Director. In 1961 he became an Assistant Administrator for Public Affairs at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. His role at NASA was “[to develop] NASA policies to insure that the character, the intent and the results of America’s space effort are correctly and adequately interpreted to the people of this country and the world…I think we, as a country, need to make quite clear to other nations of the world that we have major science efforts which are civilian rather than military controlled and with civilian and peaceful objectives.”2
Hiden T. Cox, Jr. died in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on 27 March 2000.3
PUBLICATIONS:
Cox, Hiden T. 1939. A new genus of the Rhizidiaceae. M.A. Thesis, Department of Botany, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Cox, Hiden T. 1939. A new genus of the Rhizidiaceae. Journal of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society 55(2): 389-397.
Cox, Hiden T. 1947. The comparative anatomy of the Ericaceae. Ph.D. Thesis, Department of Botany, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Cox, Hiden T. 1948. Studies in the comparative anatomy of the Ericales. I. Ericaceae Subfamily Rhododendroideae. The American Midland Naturalist 39(1): 220-245.
Cox, Hiden T. 1948. Studies in the comparative anatomy of the Ericales. II. Ericaceae Subfamily Arbutoideae. The American Midland Naturalist 40(2): 493-516.
Cox, Hiden T. 1959. The AIBS after ten years. AIBS Bulletin 9(5): 19-21.
Cox, Hiden T. 1961. How about a New Frontier in this alley? AIBS Bulletin 11(1): 11-14+20.
Cox, Hiden T. 1963. Scientists and public policy. AIBS Bulletin 13(1): 14-16.
SOURCES:
1. Pers. Comm. Nicole Wallace, UNC-CH Alumni Records to McCormick email 21 Dec. 2017.
2. Dr. Hiden T. Cox Takes Post in NASA Program. Furman University Magazine, December, 1961, p. 13.
3. Number: 231-42-0331; Issue State: Virginia; Issue Date: 1952. Ancestry.com U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014 [database online]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2011.
4. Year: 1930; Census Place: Greenville, Greenville, South Carolina; Roll: 2198; Page: 31A; Enumeration District: 0039; FHL microfilm: 2341932. Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database online]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Ooperations, Inc. 2002. Original Data: United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Fifteenth Census of the United States, 1930. Washington, D.C.: National Archives & Records Administration, 1930. T626,2,667 rolls.
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Herbarium (NCU) would appreciate receiving more information about Dr. Hiden Toy Cox, Jr. Please contact Curatrix Carol Ann McCormick via email mccormickATSIGNunc.edu