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Why an orbituary notice of a noted zoologist on the paleonet?
Kathy Mangold was one of the few marine biologists with an acute awareness
of the significance of the history of life for understanding living creatures.
As a PhD student of Adolf Portmann (1897-1983), noted professor for zoology
at the University of Basel, she was directed towards cephalopod biology
and a research activity at the Laboratoire Arago, the marine station in
Banuls-sur-Mer, Southern France, since the beginning of her carrier. Her
research activity evolved in an environment of french tradition of a somehow
encyclopaedic marine biology investigating all aspects of life, from comparative
anatomy and histology, reproduction and embryology, metabolism, neurobiology
to systematics including the history of the cephalopods. This latter aspect
of biology is expressed in her particular interest in the Nautilus, the
last survivor of the shelled (ectocochlear) cephalopods. This interest
was shared by her very close friend, the late Anna Bidder.
Kathy's monograph on the Cephalopods of the Catalan Sea,
published in 1963 (1) founded her renown as cephalopod zoologist and motivated
Portmann to transfer his responsibility for the cephalopod volume of the
Traité the Zoologie to her.- Coming back from a common excursion
to the Maledivas, one gray and cold morning in early March, immagine the
emotions finding her appartment in Basel, with the manuscript of the Traité
(800 printed pages, 450 figures) neatly disposed by chapters in little
heaps on the floor, in the state of exchange of windows! - This is just
one of many episodes hampering or delaying her monumental and for us paleontologists
most important work, finally appearing in print in 1989 (2).
Kathy Mangold expressed her knowledge and discoveries
by few but crystal-clear words. Her way of writing reflects her way of
thinking. Kathy was a person enjoying life very much but the loss of her
beloved husband Volo had darkened her last years. The scientific community
looses a researcher of extraordinary breadth in marine biology with an
outstanding feu sacré, and many of us loose a very close friend.
- Adieu, chère amie.
Lukas Hottinger, Basel
(1) Mangold-Wirz, K. 1963: Biologie des Cephalopodes benthiques
et nectoniques de la Mer Catalane. Vie et Milieu suppl.13, 1-285.
(2) Mangold, K. (ed.) 1989: Traité de Zoologie
V, Céphalopodes (Masson, Paris), 1-804.
Partial index: