| Willem Vervoort was born on 12 June 1917 in Schiedam. He read biology at Leiden university (19361941, interrupted by active war service) where he obtained his Ph.D. in 1946 under the supervision of Prof. Dr H. Boschma with a thesis entitled 'The Copepoda of the Snellius Expedition I'. In 1941 Dr Vervoort was appointed assistant, later curator of invertebrates at the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie, Leiden, where he was in charge of the invertebrates minus arthropods and molluscs. He worked at the museum on hydroids and copepods until 1950, interrupted by two trips to Antarctica where he was cetacean biologist to the national whaling company (1946/1947, 1947/1948). In the period 1950-1959 Dr Vervoort was lecturer in histology/cytology in the zoology... |
