Donald Warren Hagen, Curator of Fishes

 

Donald Warren Hagen (1934-) replaced McPhail as Curator of Fishes in 1967.  Hagen received his B.S. (1956) and M.S. (1962) degrees at the University of Texas and his Ph. D. in 1965 at the University of British Columbia.  He was mainly an experimentalist interested in the evolution of fishes, particularly the speciation process, using the three-spine stickleback, Gasterosteus aculeatus, as the experimental animal.  After a year of post-doctoral work at Yale University, Hagen was appointed to the School of Fisheries faculty effective 1 July 1967.60

Hagen was listed in UW course catalogs as teaching courses on Zoogeography of Fishes, Fish Behavior, and Speciation.61 He supervised the research of two graduate students (Appendix), employed one post-doctoral student, and received an NSF grant for his research on sticklebacks.  Hagen published papers on sticklebacks based on his research in the School (e.g., Hagen and McPhail, 1970; Hagen and Gilbertson, 1972; Hagen, 1973).  The general ichthyology courses of the School, however, were still taught by Arthur Welander.

The number of accessions to the Collection was moderately high during Hagen’s tenure, an estimated 1,061 lots (Table 1),62 but in his five years at the School of Fisheries he was not promoted and did not receive tenure.63   He left the UW in 1972 and completed his academic career in the Biology Department of the University of New Brunswick, Canada.64  The position he held at the UW was not filled for nearly six years.  The maintenance and supervision of the Fish Collection once again reverted back to Arthur Welander.

 

 

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