Amateurs and professionals studying birds at the end of the 19th century
were a contentious, passionate group with goals that intersected,
collided, and occasionally merged in their writings and organizations.
Driven by a desire to advance science, as well as by ego, pride, honor,
insecurity, religion and other clashing sensibilities, they struggled to
absorb the implications of evolution after Darwin. In the process, they
dramatically reshaped the study of birds.
Daniel Lewis here explores the professionalization of ornithology
through one of its key figures: Robert Ridgway, the Smithsonian
Institution's first curator of birds and one of North America's most
important natural scientists. Exploring a world in which the uses of
language, classification and accountability between amateurs and
professionals played essential roles, Lewis offers a vivid introduction
to Ridgway and shows how his work fundamentally influenced the direction
of American and international ornithology. He explores the inner
workings of the Smithsonian and the role of collectors working in the
field and reveals previously unknown details of the ornithological
journal The Auk and the untold story of the color dictionaries for
which Ridgway is known.
