Henry Maurice Platnauer

Henry Maurice Platnauer FGS
Born	1857 London, UK
Died	1939
Occupation(s)	Geologist Mineralogist Museum curator
Academic work
Institutions	Yorkshire Museum

Henry Maurice Platnauer FGS (1857–1939) was a British mineralogist and Museum Curator.

Career

Platnauer was educated at the City of London School and at the London University. His academic interests lay in mineralogy and he worked with the Natural History collections of the British Museum for eight years before being appointed to the position of Keeper of the Yorkshire Museum in 1883, a role he held until 1904.

Platnauer served as a Volunteer soldier in the Second Boer War and later served in the Territorial Army. During the First World War he served with the rank of Captain and was primarily involved with training units. He and his wife left York in 1912 to live in Bournemouth, where he stayed until her death in 1920, after which he returned to London. Their son, Maurice Platnauer, was a Vice-Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford.

Museums Association

Platnauer was one of the founding members of the Museums Association, which had its preliminary meeting in York in 1888 before its first official meeting the following year. Platnauer served as the joint secretary of the Association from 1889 to 1897 and co-edited the annual reports in 1890 to 1896. He eventually became its president, giving the presidential address to the annual meeting in 1911. He was also a Fellow of the Geological Society of London and a member of the Yorkshire Geological Society.

Publications

• Platnauer, H. M. 1894. "List of Figured Specimens in York Museum", Annual Report of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society.
• Platnauer, H. M. 1894. Appendix to the list of figured specimens. York.
• Howarth, E. and Platnauer, H. M. 1911. Directory of Museums in Great Britain & Ireland; together with a section on Indian and Colonial Museums.