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☆ Charles Darwin’s complete library has been reassembled for the first time
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-11 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

CNN —For the first time since his death in 1882, Charles Darwin’s impressive library has been virtually reassembled to reveal the multitude of books, pamphlets and journals cited and read by the influential naturalist. The catalog includes 9,300 links to copies of the library contents that are available for free online, inviting the public to peruse what Darwin read. After receiving letters from researchers and the public asking about specific titles from Darwin’s library, van Wyhe and his colleagues began their project to recreate it virtually in 2007. “He was a very highly educated person who learned ancient Greek and Latin in school as well as French,” van Wyhe said. “Instead of basing one’s understanding on the authors Darwin read that are mentioned in biographies, etc., anyone can now scroll through his whole library.

Persons: Charles Darwin’s, Darwin, “, ”, Dr, John van Wyhe, of Charles Darwin ”, Darwin’s, van Wyhe, ” van Wyhe, Charles Darwin, Walter William Ouless, John James Audubon, Paul Du Chaillu, John Stuart Mill, Auguste Comte, Elizabeth Gaskell’s “ Organizations: CNN, Darwin, National University of Singapore, of, University of Cambridge, Down, “, Cambridge University Library, Christ’s College Cambridge, HMS Locations: Darwin, Piecing, Downe , England, Down, Rischgitz, South America, Equatorial Africa, Africa, Swedish, Spanish

☆ Opinion | North American Birds Will No Longer Be Named for Racists — or Anybody Else
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-13 | by ( Margaret Renkl | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On Nov. 1, the American Ornithological Society announced that it would be renaming all the birds under its purview that are currently named for human beings. This change, which will affect some 150 North American birds, has been a long time coming. Ornithologists and amateur birders alike have long wrestled with the historical nature of bird names bestowed by early collectors. Some of the birds — not all, it’s important to note, but some — were named for people who held views considered repugnant today. John James Audubon, for whom the Audubon’s shearwater is named, was an unrepentant slaveholder who opposed emancipation.

Persons: Colleen Handel, John James Audubon, slaveholder, Winfield Scott Organizations: American Ornithological Society, Ornithologists

☆ The Original Birders Gave Photography a Run for its Money
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-03 | by ( Walker Mimms | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

As the National Audubon Society recovers from a referendum to change its name in light of the fact that America’s founding birder was a slave owner (the name stayed), a luxe reissue of John James Audubon’s magnum opus, BIRDS OF AMERICA (Abbeville, $195), proves the man’s artistry itself unimpeachable. His paintings foretold the ambitions of the camera, and at only a quarter of the size of the four-volume folio that was first published between 1827 and 1838, this still hefty edition preserves the poetic backdrops and fierce detail of the original. The copperplate lines are so exact they mimic the individual venation of feathers; the neck of a gyrfalcon takes on all the ripply realism of moiréd silk.

Persons: birder, John James Audubon’s Organizations: National Audubon Society, OF Locations: Abbeville

Birds in North America will no longer be named after people, the American Ornithological Society announced Wednesday. “There is power in a name, and some English bird names have associations with the past that continue to be exclusionary and harmful today,” the organization's president, Colleen Handel, said in a statement. “Everyone who loves and cares about birds should be able to enjoy and study them freely.”Rather than review each bird named after a person individually, all such birds will be renamed, the organization announced. She said heated discussions over bird names have been happening within birdwatching communities for the past several years. And a group called Bird Names for Birds sent a petition to the ornithological society urging it to “outline a plan to change harmful common names” of birds.

Persons: Colleen Handel, Alexander Wilson, John James Audubon, John P, McCown, “ I'm, ”, Emily Williams, Susan Bell, Christian Cooper, Amy Cooper, Cooper, birdwatchers Organizations: American Ornithological Society, Confederate Army, Georgetown University, National Audubon Society, National Audubon Society's, Audubon, Birds, Associated Press Health, Science Department, Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science, Educational Media Group, AP Locations: North America, U.S, Canada, ”, New

☆ An Avian Murder Case on a Quiet Back Porch
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-02 | by ( Daryln Brewer Hoffstot | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

I open the pantry door and the eastern phoebe flies off the nest. Before eastern phoebes lived so close to humans, they built their nests on cliffs. Every year for 35 years, we’ve had an eastern phoebe nest under the eaves of our back porch. Eastern phoebes have the distinction of being the first bird ever banded, in 1804 by John James Audubon himself. He, too, watched an eastern phoebe nest at his farm in Mill Grove, Pa., about 200 miles east of here as the flycatcher flies.

Persons: we’ve, phoebe, ”, John James Audubon Locations: phoebes, North America, Virginia, Mill Grove, Pa

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