Frederick Morrill Swain

Frederick Morrill Swain, 91, Edina, died Sunday, March 2, 2008, at N.C. Little Memorial Hospice, Edina.He was born March 17, 1916, in Kansas City, Mo., the son of Frederick Morrill Sr. and Lurline Hughes Swain. He received a bachelor’s degree and doctorate from Kansas University in Lawrence. He received a master’s degree from Penn State. He was a longtime resident of Lawrence.Mr. Swain became professor emeritus for the department of geology and geophysics at the University of Minnesota in 1979. He then joined the faculty at the University of Delaware in Newark, where he taught and served as department chair until he retired in 1986. He spent his career researching micropaleontology, biostratigraphy and organic geochemistry.He was a member and fellow of the Geological Society of America, a member of the Paleontological Society, a member and emeritus of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists and Society of Sedimentary Geology and a member of Sigma Xi. He last published a book on the fossil nonmarine Ostracoda of the USA, covering more than 500 species in regard to their stratigraphic distribution, paleoecology and morphologic characteristics during the Devonian period through the Pleistocene epoch.Mr. Swain was preceded in death by his wife of 68 years, Frances Blair Swain. Survivors include two daughters, Annette, Minneapolis, and Suzanne Charnes and husband John, Charlotte, N.C., formerly of Lawrence; and a granddaughter, Sarah Elizabeth Charnes, Washington, D.C.