The Edward Bruce Williamson collection contains material dating from 1891 and spanning the next forty years until his death in 1933. Most of the collection focuses on Williamson's activities as an entomologist, though also it includes some personal correspondence and photographs. The collection is divided into four series, Correspondence, 1891-1935, Drawings, Miscellaneous, Notes and Paper Drafts, and Photographs.
Edward Bruce Williamson was born into a banking family in Bluffton, Indiana. Williamson joined the family business as a clerk, and took over as president of the Wells County Bank in 1918. Though he retained banking as his profession, his true interest was not finance, but biology. He had a profound interest in entomology, and in particular odonata, the order of insects encompassing dragon and damselflies. He went on frequent odonata collecting trips, often accompanied by his cousin and fellow dragonfly enthusiast, Jess Williamson. These trips took him as far Venezuela and Trinidad, though much of his research focused on the dragonflies of Indiana and the American Midwest.
Though Williamson was never a professional scholar, he was considered one of the foremost odonata experts in the world by his colleagues. He was particularly interested in taxonomic entomology and identified a number of new dragonfly species throughout his career. He donated many of the specimens he collected to museums around the country, and was regularly asked to identify species collected by other museums, universities, and scholars. His many correspondents include odonata experts as well as representatives of Chicago's Field Museum, the Smithsonian, and the British Museum. He was a member of the Entomological Society of America, as well as the Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio Academies of Science. He was appointed president of the Indiana Academy of Science in 1918, and was the first man to hold that post for two successive years.
In December, 1916, the University of Michigan Board of Regents, at the recommendation of Alexander Ruthven, appointed E.B. Williamson to the post of curator of odonata at the University of Michigan Museum of Zoology. During his tenure as curator Williamson facilitated the growth and development of an impressive collection of odonata which he made available for research and exhibition. He remained in the post until 1933 when he retired to dedicate his time to his iris farm in Bluffton.
Though the bulk of this collection focuses on Williamson the entomologist he was also a respected botanist and iris breeder. He bred a number of award-winning irises, many of which are still considered premium-breeding stock today. It was this business which supported his family after his bank collapsed at the height of the Great Depression.
