Habeck, James R. (James Robert), 1932-

James R. Habeck was born June 3, 1932, in Ashland, Wisconsin. He received his elementary through high school education in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, graduating from high school June, 1950.

Habeck started college at University Wisconsin-Milwaukee that fall, majoring in preforestry. He spent summers of 1951, 1952 and 1953 in northern Idaho working as a seasonal employee of U.S. Forest Service, doing white pine blister rust control work plus summer firefighting. He attended the University of Montana in Missoula (then Montana State University) for the academic year 1952-1953 and switched his major to botany that year. In fall 1953, Habeck resumed studies in botany at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, taking a BA degree in botany in August, 1954. He began the graduate program in1954 majoring in plant ecology, minoring in wildlife biology. His dissertation research focused on ecological impacts of whitetail deer on winter range in eastern white cedar swamps in northern Wisconsin. He was awarded a PhD in plant ecology at UW-Madison in August 1959.

In September 1959, Habeck began college teaching at Oregon College of Education at Monmouth, Oregon. In September 1960, he was hired for the plant ecology professorship position at the University of Montana in Missoula (UM). During summers from 1965 to 1980, Habeck conducted research and published on interactions between wildfire and Northern Rocky Mountain forest vegetation, funded by the National Park Service, the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Forest Service, resulting in about 75 publications. He taught botany and plant ecology classes at UM from 1960 to 1992 as well as directing the graduate studies of about 35 Masters and PhD graduate students.

Habeck took a three year post retirement contract starting in 1992 and retired in 1995; the University Board of Regents awarded him an Emeritus Professorship in 1992. In his post retirement years, Habeck routinely attends and participates in Missoula open space and park management committee meetings. He has also researched a number of biographic compilations on the University of Montana's early day professors of biology and botany, other professional botanists, and other topics.