[Bristol-Birds] Historical Snippet - Mar 30, 1991
- From: "Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Bristol-birds" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2008 17:11:16 -0500
BBC Snippet
March 30, 1991, Tom Laughlin hosted the Bristol Bird Club at
Virginia Tech and the Virginia Museum of Natural History Bird Collection
in Blacksburg.
Eleven BBC members made the trip. It was the first of three such visits
to the museum sponsored over the next several years.
The Bailey-Law Ornithology Collections totaled almost 20,000 specimens
and was completely cataloged. The bird holdings consisted of more than
18,000 identified study skins stored in cabinets in the zoological
collections area.
The collection contained 1,200 egg sets, identified
by A.O.U. numbers. Most of the specimens date
from 1870-1940 with skins including Ivory-billed
Woodpeckers, Passenger Pigeons and
Carolina Parakeets.
The Bailey-Law Collection (c.1850-1970) consists
of the papers, books, monographs, and specimens
of two ornithologists, Bailey (1878-1962) and
John Eugene Law (1877-1931). Bailey was the son
of Harold B. Bailey, a noted ornithologist and one
of the founders of the American Ornithologists' Union.
The younger Harold H. Bailey grew up in Newport
News, Virginia, and wrote two books, The Birds of
Virginia (1913) and The Birds of Florida (1925).
Law was active in the Cooper Ornithological Club
in California at an early date, and in 1919 he became
a curator with the California Museum of Vertebrate
Zoology in Berkeley. Laura Beatty Law, was married
to Eugene Law until his death in 1931. She later
married Bailey in 1938. The two merged their
large collections. A special museum was built at
Rock Bridge Alum to house their holdings.
Eventually, the Bailey family made a gift of the collection to Virginia Tech.
At Virginia Tech in 1991, BBC members spent hours studying species they
found of interest, including holding several extinct species study skins and
enormous Golden Eagles. Taking photos was a high priority for everyone.
Your have never seen so many bright eyes and big smiles as when a
birder holds an Ivory-billed, Carolina Parakeet or Passenger Pigeon !
After hours of study and amazement, birders broke for lunch and
enjoyed subs and sandwiches at a student pub near the Virginia Tech
campus. Everyone returned to the collection for the afternoon.
Members were also fascinated by some of the oldest and most
historical of early American ornithological books and journals --
many easily a century old.
From the archives of the Bristol Bird Club
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