M. C. Cooke

Mordecai Cubitt Cooke (1825–1914) was an English botanist and the leading mycologist of his generation. Born in Norfolk, he taught school and worked in the India Museum before joining the staff of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in 1880, where he catalogued fungi for twelve years. He founded the journal Grevillea in 1872 and the Quekett Microscopical Club, wrote the Handbook of British Fungi and the eight-volume Illustrations of British Fungi, and produced popular works including Fungi: Their Nature and Uses, A Plain and Easy Account of British Fungi and The Seven Sisters of Sleep, an early study of narcotic plants. He received the Linnean Medal in 1903.