John Whitaker Hulke

John Whitaker Hulke was an English surgeon, geologist and fossil collector born November 6, 1830, in Deal, Kent, England, who died February 19, 1895, and who first described the eye condition now known as oculodermal melanosis, or nevus of Ota, in 1861, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1867 for his research on the anatomy and physiology of the retina, and served as surgeon at the Royal Ophthalmic Hospital, Moorfields, and later at Middlesex Hospital. Alongside his medical career he became a leading authority on the dinosaurs of the Wealden deposits, locating a complete Iguanodon braincase in 1869 and publishing more than fifty geological papers, twenty eight of them on dinosaurs including Iguanodon and Hypsilophodon. He served as president of the Geological Society from 1882 to 1884, president of the Pathological Society of London in 1883, and president of the Royal College of Surgeons from 1893 until his death, and he received the Wollaston Medal in 1887.