Isaac Lea

Isaac Lea (March 4, 1792 – December 8, 1886) was an American publisher, conchologist and geologist. He was a partner in the publishing businesses Matthew Carey & Sons; Carey, Lea & Carey; Carey, Lea & Blanchard; and Lea & Blanchard. He authored multiple books describing the freshwater mussel genus Unio and named 1,842 species of fifty genera of freshwater and land mollusks. He sparked a scientific controversy amongst geologists when he published about his discovery of fossilized footprints in Mount Carbon, Pennsylvania, that he incorrectly proposed were from a reptile from the Devonian Period over 360 million years old. The fossil has since been identified as that of an amphibian from the Mississippian Age over 330 million years old. He served as president of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia from 1858 to 1863 and of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences in 1860. Early life and education Lea was born on March 4, 1792, in Wilmington, Delaware. His grandparents, John and Hannah Hopton Lea, emigrated to the Province of Pennsylvania with William Penn in 1699. His parents were James J. Lea, a merchant, and Elizabeth Gibson Lea. He was studying to be a physician, but began working at his brother John's import business in Philadelphia at the age of 15.