Restrictions to Access

This collection contains additional materials that are not available for immediate or same day access. Please contact Research and Instructional Service staff at wilsonlibrary@unc.edu to discuss options for consulting these materials.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the John Nathaniel Couch papers #3810, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Received from John N. Couch in October 1968 and July 1986 and the John N. Couch Biology Library in November 1998 (Acc. 98239).

Transferred from Botany Section, John N. Couch Biology Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in November 1998 (Acc. 98239).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Marion Presler and Linda Sellars, July 1987; Arturo Bagley, August 2000

Updated by: Laura Hart, February 2021

Encoded by: ByteManagers Inc., 2008

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• Botanists--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Botany--Study and teaching (Higher)--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Chapel Hill (N.C.)--Social life and customs.
• Coker, William Chambers, 1872-1953.
• College teachers--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Couch, John Nathaniel, 1896-
• East Indian students--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Fungi--Study and teaching (Higher)--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Mycologists--United States--History--20th century.
• National Science Foundation (U.S.)--History.
• North Carolina Academy of Science--History.
• Olive, Lindsay S.
• Pakistani students--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• Science--United States--Societies, etc.--History--20th century.
• Students, Foreign--North Carolina--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962)--Faculty--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962)--History--20th century.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962). Dept. of Biology.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962). Dept. of Botany.
• University of North Carolina (1793-1962). Dept. of Zoology.
• Women scientists--Selection and appointment--North Carolina--History--20th century.

• William Chambers Coker Papers (03220); Lindsay Shepherd Olive Papers (04335); Department of Botany of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Records (40078)

John Nathaniel Couch was born 12 October 1896 in Prince Edward County, Va. His father, John Henry Couch, was a Baptist minister, and his mother, Sally Love Terry Couch, was a school teacher. In 1927, Couch married Else Dorothy Ruprecht of Brooklyn, N.Y. They had two children, John Phillip Couch and Sally Louise Couch Gooder.

Couch received his secondary education in the public schools of Virginia, Kentucky, West Virginia, and North Carolina. In 1914, Couch entered Trinity College, now Duke University, but transferred in 1917 to the University of North Carolina to study medicine. His career in medicine was short-lived because he came under the influence of W. C. Coker of the Botany Department, and decided to major in botany instead. His education was interrupted by World War I. In September 1918, he joined the American Expeditionary Force in France. While he was in France, he studied at the University of Nancy and received his bachelor of arts from the University of North Carolina in absentia.

When Couch returned from France in July 1919, he taught science at Charlotte (N.C.) High School. In 1920, he began teaching at Chapel Hill High School while he completed his master's degree, which he received in 1922. While Couch worked on his doctorate, he was an instructor of botany at the University. He was made an assistant professor in 1924 after receiving his Ph.D. By 1932, Couch was a full professor, and, in 1945, he was awarded a Kenan chair.

Couch was known internationally for his research in mycology, the study of fungi. He began his work in the 1920s under his mentor, W. C. Coker, also a noted mycologist. His first work was on the sexuality and structure of aquatic fungi. He discovered a new type of reproduction in Dictyuchus called heterothalism. During this period, he also assisted Coker in his study of gasteromycetes. In 1928, he co-authored the book The Gasteromycetes of the Eastern United States and Canada with Coker.

In 1925, Couch became interested in tree diseases and specifically in Septobasidium, a fungus that grows on living trees and is always associated with scale insects. Before Couch did his study of Septobasidium, it was assumed that the fungus eventually destroyed scale insects and was not harmful to the trees it grew on. Couch's research, however, showed that the fungus and scale insects lived in symbiotic harmony at the expense of the host trees. In 1926, Couch was awarded a Natural Research Council Fellowship in Botany to pursue his research at the Carnegie Station for Experimental Genetics, Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. In the summer of 1926, he joined the Johns Hopkins Botanical Exploration in Jamaicirca He spent the next year at the Missouri Botanical Garden. Couch's work on Septobasidium was published in a number of articles, and, in 1938, he published a monograph, The Genus Septobasidium This work earned Couch the Walker Grand Prize from the Boston Society of Natural History in 1939, and, in 1943, a membership in the National Academy of Sciences, one of the first awarded to a Southern scientist.

In addition to his research on Septobasidium, Couch is also noted for his discovery in 1949 of the genus Actinoplanes, an organism that may provide a link between fungi and bacteria. Starting in the 1960s, Couch devoted his attention to studying Coelomomyces, a parastic fungus that attacks the larvae of the malarial mosquito. He published a monograph, The Genus Coelomomyces, with former student, Dr. Charles Bland, in 1985.

Couch was active in various professional organizations throughout his career. He was president of the American Mycological Society, 1943; president of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society, 1937-1938; a fellow in the American Association for the Advancement of Science and chairman of the botany section, 1962; a special advisor to the U.S. Office of Research and Development, 1944; and cultural exchange specialist to India; 1961.

Couch was chairman of the botany department at the University of North Carolina, 1944-1960. He retired in 1968 but still remained active in the department as Emeritus Kenan Professor. He was deeply opposed to the merger of the Botany Department with the Zoology Department to form a Biology Department in 1982 and was active in the unsuccessful effort to prevent the merger.

Couch donated land to the University in 1977, to be sold and the proceeds used to support botany studies. In 1984, the money from the sale of the land went to establish the John N. Couch Professorship in Botany. In 1979, the Botany Library was renamed in his honor. John Couch died in Chapel Hill, 16 December 1986.

These papers document John N. Couch's career as a mycologist--his research, teaching, and participation in professional organizations. There are few family or personal items. Correspondence, research notes and data, lecture notes and other teaching materials, reference material, and photographs may be found in the collection.

The papers are arranged in the series and subseries listed below. The arrangement reflects Couch's organization of his files. The general correspondence was removed from letter file boxes and placed in folders for easier access. Correspondence that Couch separated from his chronological files may be found in Series 2 or Series 3. Couch's file titles have been retained in most cases. In Series 2, files that Couch did not label as part of a major group are filed in Subseries 2.4. Photographs that illustrated research materials were kept with those materials.Photographs of people were separated and filed in Series 5.

• This collection contains two discrete sets of photographic materials. Each set is are housed separately.
• Photographs related to research on Actinoplanes are in image folders (PF-3810/1-80).
• Photographs of John Nathaniel Couch and others are individually numbered. (P-3180/1-83).