Edmund Brisco Ford, known as Henry Ford or by his initials (i.e. E.B. Ford) was a British ecological geneticist and Fellow of the Royal Society (F.R.S.). His name is sometimes written as "Edmund Briscoe Ford".

At a young age he became interested in lepidoptera.

Ford was a pupil and follower of Ronald Fisher. Like Fisher, he continued the Anglo-American selection vs drift feud, particularly with Sewall Wright. He was an experimentalist, and wanted to test evolution in nature. See his magnum opus Ecological Genetics (Ford, 1964 & later editions). However, note that some of his work has been criticised. Nevertheless, he laid much of the groundwork for more modern studies, which also benefit from biochemical techniques now available.

In 1954 he won the Royal Society's Darwin Medal.

Ford was an eccentric so biographies are interesting to say the least. Marren (1995) has a biographical chapter. Hooper (2002) gives an interesting account of Ford and his relationship with Bernard Kettlewell and Kettlewell's work on melanism in the peppered moth, Biston betularia. However, it has had scathing reviews (see for example, Clark 2003), as it appears to support Creationism. He also had a biographical memoir from The Royal Society (Clark 1995 (?).

Table of contents

1 External Links 2 Biographies 3 Bibliography 4 Dedicated Works

External Links

Papers co-written with Ronald Fisher are available on the University of Adelaide's website http://www.library.adelaide.edu.au/digitised/fisher/index.html

Biographies

• Marren P. (1995). The New Naturalists. HarperCollins: London
• Clarke B (1995). Edmund Brisco Ford. Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society of London ?:147
• Hooper J. (2002). Of Moths and Men - An Evolutionary Tale - The Untold Story of Science and the Peppered Moth. (a heavily criticised popular science book which includes Ford).

• Ford E.B. (1931). Mendelism and Evolution. Methuen, London.
• Carpenter G.D.H. and E.B. Ford (1933) Mimicry. Methuen, London
• Ford E.B. (1938). The Study of Heredity. Butterworth, London. 2nd Edn OUP.
• Ford E.B. (1942, 7th edn 1973). Genetics for Medical Students Chapman and Hall: London.
• Ford E.B. (1945, 3rd edn 1977). New Naturalist 1: Butterflies. Collins: London.
• Ford E.B. (1955, 3rd edn 1972). New Naturalist 30: Moths. HarperCollins: London
• Ford E.B. (1964), 4th edn 1975). 'Ecological Genetics'. Chapman and Hall: London
• Ford E.B. (1965). Genetic Polymorphisms. Faber and Faber: London
• Ford E.B. (1976). Genes and Adaptation Institute of Biology studies. Edward Arnold: London
• Ford E.B. (1979). Understanding Genetics. Faber and Faber: London
• Ford E.B. (1981). Taking Genetics into the Countryside. Weidenfeld and Nicholson: London
• Ford E.B. and J.S. Haywood (1984). 'Church treasures of the Oxford District''. Alan Sutton: Gloucester (N.B. This is not on genetics!)