Over this past weekend, in an early-afternoon break
in the rain, I saw a large group of bird watchers along the Palisades in
northern New Jersey. I’m sure that more than a few of them realize the huge
debt they owe to Roger Tory Peterson. After all, back in 1934, the upstate New
York native published Field Guide to the Birds,
and over the next half century he expanded on this achievement with still more
in-depth guides to birds and other wildlife. “In this century‚ no one has done more to promote an interest
in living creatures than Roger Tory Peterson,” the environmental Paul Ehrlich
has claimed.
The image accompanying this post is of the Main
Reading Room at the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History in Jamestown, N.Y. I took this photo while on
vacation a month ago at the nearby Chautauqua Institution.
The entire building was designed by the famous architectural firm Robert A.M. Stern, but, as a former librarian—and a continuing, inveterate library patron—I was especially drawn to this room. The combination of the light brown wood and the warm sunshine pouring through the windows gives the room the kind of inviting, natural feeling that Peterson would have valued.
The entire building was designed by the famous architectural firm Robert A.M. Stern, but, as a former librarian—and a continuing, inveterate library patron—I was especially drawn to this room. The combination of the light brown wood and the warm sunshine pouring through the windows gives the room the kind of inviting, natural feeling that Peterson would have valued.
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