Member

Bob was born on April 16, 1913, in Kansas City, Missouri, and was raised in Grimes, Iowa, where he graduated from high school in 1932. He completed his undergraduate education at the University of Iowa in 1936 and received an MS degree in zoology from the University of Michigan in 1937. He conducted post-graduate work there on the life history of the common yellowthroat. Bob was a World War II veteran, stationed at Pearl Harbor in 1942 with the Naval Medical Corps. Bob’s entire professional career was as a wildlife research biologist with the federal government. He began with the Bureau of Biological Survey, which later became the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. From 1940 to 1960, Bob was stationed at Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Maryland, where he completed significant research on bird populations of Maryland, particularly waterfowl of the Chesapeake Bay, and small bird populations in Maine. He was a member of the 1955 expedition to find the breeding grounds of whooping cranes in the Northwest Territory of Canada. In 1960, he transferred to the Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center in Jamestown, North Dakota. As a research scientist he was a pioneer in plant and animal ecology, and authored 87 publications. He was the writer of several books, including Birds of Maryland and Washington, DC, and Breeding Birds of North Dakota. While gathering data on breeding birds of North Dakota, he literally traveled to every county and township in the state. His research in North Dakota included the ecology of prairie wetlands where he developed a classification of wetlands for the glaciated prairie. Bob retired from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 1976, after 40 years of federal service. He received the Meritorious Service Award in 1976 from the Secretary of the Interior, an honor award given to recognize his significant scientific accomplishments within the U.S. Department of the Interior. In 1977, Mr. Stewart received the North Dakota Award from the North Dakota Chapter of The Wildlife Society for his outstanding contributions to wildlife management. Bob married Marjorie Bemis from Des Moines in 1936. They had a daughter, Margo Yerby, of Century, Florida, and three sons, Dr. Robert Stewart, Jr., of Lafayette, Louisiana, Dr. William Stewart, of Jamestown, North Dakota, and Craig Stewart of Shellrock, Iowa. He had 12 grandchildren and six great grandchildren. An avid naturalist and waterfowl hunter, Bob was a member of numerous professional societies. He was a fellow of the American Ornithologists' Union, a member of the Wilson Ornithological Society, Cooper Ornithological Society, The Wildlife Society, the North Dakota Natural History Society, and the Ecological Society of America. Bob was elected to membership in the Washington Biologists’ Field Club in 1945. Bob died on July 15, 1993, in Florida while visiting his daughter. He was 80 years old.