Raymond Pearl (June 3, 1879 – November 17, 1940) was an American biologist, regarded as one of the founders of biogerontology. He spent most of his career at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Pearl was a prolific writer of academic books, papers and articles, as well as a committed populariser and communicator of science. At his death, 841 publications were listed against his name. Early life Pearl was born into an upper-middle-class family on June 3, 1879, in Farmington, New Hampshire, the son of Ida May (McDuffee) and Frank Pearl. At an early age, Pearl was exposed to the classics. His parents and grandparents wanted him to study Greek and Latin. However, when he attended Dartmouth College at 16 years old, he became fascinated by biology and graduated with a B.A. as the youngest in his class. At Dartmouth, he was known to be an exceptional student as well as a skilled musician. He was capable of playing almost every wind instrument, and he planned amateur music performances with his friends and colleagues. In 1899, Pearl attended the University of Michigan where he received his PhD in zoology for his work on the behavior of planarians. He also was involved in studying the variation of fish for the Biological Survey of the Great Lakes. While working in a zoological laboratory, he met his future wife, Maude M. De Witt. In 1903, they married, and together in 1905 and 1906, they traveled abroad and worked at the University of London, University of Leipzig, and Marine Biological Station in Naples. In 1906, he spent a year studying under Karl Pearson at University College, London. During this year he discovered biometry, which seemed to offer a solution to the problems he was concerned with in biology, zoology and eugenics. On his return to the US he continued his interests, but was converted from biometry to Mendelian genetics. Career Pearl's interest in statistical methods in biology began at the University of London, where he worked alongside Karl Pearson. He stayed as an instructor at the University of Michigan until 1906, and that same year, he went to the University of Pennsylvania to be an instructor in zoology. A year later, he became the head of the Department of Biology of the Main Agricultural Experiment Station at the University of Maine in Orono where he studied the genetics of poultry and other domestic animals. From