William Bartram (1739-1823), American botanist and writer. Bartram was the fifth son of the noted botanist John Bartram. As a child he showed talent for drawing plants, and was offered a position as a printer by Benjamin Franklin. He declined this, instead setting off on a 640- kilometre-long expedition along St John's River, Florida, with his father. In 1791 Bartram published his Travels to much acclaim, although the virtues that he attributed to the Native American people he encountered were seen as foolish. Bartram joined the 1803 expedition to Louisiana, recording and collecting botany of the region.