Melville Jacobs

Melville Jacobs was an American anthropologist known for his extensive fieldwork on cultures of the Pacific Northwest. He was born in New York City. After studying with Franz Boas he became a member of the faculty of the University of Washington in 1928 and remained until his death in 1971. Especially during the earlier part of his career, from 1928 until 1936, he collected large amounts of linguistic data and text from a wide range of languages including Sahaptin, Molale, Kalapuya, Clackamas, Tillamook, Alsea, Upper Umpqua, Galice and Chinook Jargon.