is a great read for history buffs or biologists or birdwatchers!
Imagine having your name given to a plant or animal species because you were the first person to see it or describe it!
That is the kind of immortality many of the early colonial naturalists have earned as they explored the NEW WORLD.
People like Bartram, Audubon, Cuthbertson, Wilson, and many others, including Lewis and Clark had sponsors from wealthy European clients.
Benjamin Franklin is revered within the name of a southern tree-
Franklinia.
The tree was rare in the 1700's and may have been saved by the Bartrams who brought seeds into gardens to cultivate and observe them. Today these trees are ornamentals and they are all from that historic stock. To the best of our knowledge the trees do not exist in the wild anymore.
Joseph Kastner takes the reader on a well-researched journey which includes vivid descriptions taken from the field notes of many of these great naturalists.
The humor and honor among naturalists is refreshing and Kastner presents these people as individuals with each their own character.
When some Europeans doubted the veracity of some of the claims coming from this colony, Thomas Jefferson sent a full grown MOOSE to Europe to prove his case that these animals are huge and very real!
I thoroughly enjoyed travelling with these historic explorers through their stilted language and formalities. Wilson's saga of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker is as touching as it is tragic.
