Katsura Ōyama
Katsura Ōyama was a Japanese paleontologist and zoologist, best known for his work on the Tertiary and Recent Mollusca of Japan.
Early life
Ōyama was born on October 6, 1917, the second son of Duke Kashiwa Ōyama, who was the second son of Ōyama Iwao. He graduated from the Department of Zoology, Tokyo Imperial University in 1941, and in the following year took up an assistant position in the Natural Resources Institute of the Interior Ministry.Professional career
In July 1944, Ōyama moved to the Imperial Navy's Macassar Research Institute in present-day Indonesia, working as a researcher until the Institute's dissolution in May, 1946. Thereafter he returned to Tokyo and resumed his position at the Natural Resources Institute. In 1947, he took up a concurrent position at the Geological Survey of Japan. Ōyama received his PhD in 1955, and almost immediately left for a period of postdoctoral research with Dr. Myra Keen at Stanford University in California that lasted until April 1957.In 1979, Ōyama retired from the Geological Survey and founded a research laboratory at Toba Aquarium in Mie, also housing his vast library of paleontological and malacological literature.
Publications
Ōyama was a prolific author, both independently and in collaboration with others. Between 1959 and 1963, he published a six-part photographic catalog of many Japanese molluscan families, co-authored with Yoshio Takemura. Together with Tadashige Habe and Tokubei Kuroda he was commissioned by the publisher Maruzen to co-author The Seashells of Sagami Bay on behalf of the Imperial Household.Ōyama's collected papers were republished in two volumes, one to celebrate his 70th birthday in 1987 and one for his 77th in 1994. A memorial volume of reminiscences and photographs appeared in 1996, following his death on December 30, 1995.