The ASM’s Bylaws: a brief history and summary

ASM History: Presidents/Vice-Presidents

“…The first listing of members, published in the Journal of Mammalogy in 1920, included 358 individuals from 15 countries. The photograph taken of attendees at the organizational meeting of the Society in 1919 shows 14 women and 43 men (Timm and McLaren 2019). Running the ASM has been a team effort from the beginning, with legions of members serving on committees, working closely with elected officers and other colleagues behind the scenes, and volunteers quietly running much Society business.…”

“…Here we: (1) trace the history of the positions of President and Vice-President in the ASM; (2) bring together information on the members who served as President; and (3) compare some characteristics of the cohort of ASM Presidents with the cohort of the ASM North American Honorary Members (Genoways et al 2023). The ASM has published several excellent discussions of the presidents of the organization and it is not our intention to review or duplicate these publications (Hoffmeister 1969; Layne and Hoffmann 1994; Merrick and Wilson 2019; Timm and McLaren 2019). ASM Vice-Presidents, on the other hand, have received minimal attention in the past, so we present an initial summary of those members who did not later serve as President.…”

“…The Vice-President was to be elected to a 1-year term, but could be re-elected. The term for this office was changed from 1 year to 2 in a group of Bylaws amendments passed at the second Members Meeting in 2013, but not published in the Journal until 2018 ( Journal of Mammalogy 99:1553, 2018; McLaren and Timm 2019).…”

“…The reason William B. Davis (1955–1958) served an extra year “was the result of a desire of the membership to maintain administrative continuity during a period of reorganization of the society's finances” (Layne and Hoffmann 1994:24; Schmidly and Dixon 1998). Examining the ASM records reveals that during Davis' tenure publishing for the Journal of Mammalogy was moved from Waverly, Inc., in Baltimore, Maryland, to Allen Press in Lawrence, Kansas (Genoways et al 2020), and the positions of Corresponding Secretary and Treasurer were combined, with the office moved to Stillwater, Oklahoma, with Bryan P. Glass serving in the position ( Journal of Mammalogy 38:551, 1957; McLaren and Timm 2019). Most recently, Douglas A. Kelt served from 2018 to 2021 because of the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.…”

“…Since 1999 and moving to a President-Elect and Vice-President arrangement, seven of the Presidents have served as the Vice-President—Patterson, Cameron, Timm, Mares, Lacey, Sikes, and Smith. The Vice-Presidents who went on to serve as President have been recorded in ASM history primarily through their service as President (Layne and Hoffmann 1994; Merrick and Wilson 2019; Timm and McLaren 2019).…”