Great Nebraska

Naturalists and Scientists

Nebraska Ornithologists’ Union

Letters, 1904, December

1904, Dec.

The State Board of Agriculture
Of Delaware

S. H. Messick, Bridgeville, President
J. T. Shallcross, Middletown Vice President.
A. W. Slaymaker, Camden, Secretary.

Charles J. Pennock, Ornithologist

Kennett Square, Pa. [illegible]
04 DEC 6 Ans’d

Klopp & Bartlett Co.
Gentlemen
Please give me price “A Prelim Review of the Birds of Nebraska” – Bruner, Walcott & Swenk [illegible]
Very Truly Yours
C. J. Pennock

State Board of Agriculture
C. J. Pennock
ORNITHOLOGIST
Kennett Square, Pa.
Delaware

371-00141

1904, Dec. 4

DEC 9 Rec’d

Berkeley, Dec. 4th 1904

My dear Professor:-
Your letter in colaboration with Swenk’s just received, and as I have more time just at present than I will have for some time I will answer at once. I was very glad to hear from you. It has been so long since any of the Nebr. bird people have written that I began to think that I had been ostracized. Wolcott is so busy with his card catalogue that as far as getting an answer is concerned one might as well address a letter to the moon.
Your joke about bird-killing was not taken as seriously as you think. I can still appreciate a joke even it is on myself. Bird people are rather active in this section. We have several good meetings during the year. On the first Tuesday of the month the Section of Ornithology of the Academy of Sciences meets. At those meetings we sometimes have the pleasure of hearing some of the more prominent ornithologists speak. At the last Mr. Mel[illegible], the authority on Mexican birds, gave a talk

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Dr. Merriam of the Biological Survey was also Dr. Means & Professor Henshaw one of the founders of the A. O. U. were at recent meetings. So you see that even if we are in an out of the way corner of the U. S. we get some of the cream. The meetings of the Cooper Club are held bi-monthly, they are more like the meetings we used to enjoy so much in Lincoln, being held at the homes of the members, either in Oakland, San Francisco, Palo Alto or somewhere around the bay. The next meeting will be the annual dinner at a cafe in San F. about the middle of January. Many of the standbys of California Ornithology are present Walter Fisher, Joe Grinnell, W. O. Emerson and others. Then there are local Audubon societies that have monthly meetings that are very well attended, one in Berkeley was organized about two months ago and already has a hundred members. We have also the best collection of water birds in the U.S. if not in the world, at the Academy. Many species not found in the British Museum are represented in it. The value of the collection is over $50,000, and it is constantly being added to So when you size things up you will see

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t we are not ornithologicaly dead out here I wish that it were possible, as you suggest, to get some new blood into the N. O. U. There seems to have been no one to take the place of Crawford, Cory, W. H. and others. If yourself and Wolcott would drop out I see where the N. O. U. would be suspended. Have you ever considered the feasibility of running a quarterly publication insead of the annual? It would seem to me that there ought to be room for such in the Middle West. Do not confine papers and other matter to the state, but include all the states between the Rockies and the Mississippi. The Condor covers all the western part of the U.S.; that is west of the Rockies. I would like to see an organization of all the ornithologists in that section and I do not think it would be difficult to accomplish. If I were in Nebraska I would see if something of that sort could be done. My work in economic ornithology is hanging fine, on account of the stomach examinations going on so slow. The results are going to be very interesting. Sometime in the future, if I am still in the state I want to undertake some of the same sort of work in the San Joaquin Valley

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and also in other parts. That however is a section in which the study will have to run for at least a year. It will have to be done sometime, but whether it will be in my day I don’t know.
I was working this past summer on grasshoppers in the Joaquin Valley. My report is just finished and will be printed about the first of the year. I will send you a copy as soon as it is out.
I have already written more than I had intended so will close, with best wishes for the holiday season.
Very truly yours
J. S. Hunter

371-00142

1904, Dec. 7

Reilly’s Barber Shop,
J.G. Reilly, Prop….
Bath Room, Laundry Agency.

Elgin, Nebraska, Dec 7 1904

Prof Bruner Lincoln, Neb.
Dear sir -:
I am an amateur taxidermist and have recently mounted two eagles and would like to have information as to what species they belong and as Mr. Bell of the firm of Sessions + Bell of Norfolk recommended you I will ask the favor of an answer. The first bird is a kind of brownish grey and has part of the leg bare of feathers and the front claws are all of nearly equal length.
The second is a black bird with the back of the head and neck

371-00143a

Agency.

Elgin, Nebraska, 190

a light brown and is feathers to the foot and the inner claw is the largest of the three
If you can give me the information from this description please do so and oblige.
Yours truly
J. G. Reilly
Elgin
Neb.

371-00143b

1904, Dec. 8

Lincoln, Nebr., Dec. 8, 1904.

Reilly,
Elgin, Nebr.

Dear Sir:-
If your birds are large enough to be eagles, if they measure over 5 ft. in wing expanse they are respectively the bald eagle and the golden eagle. If otherwise, I should say that the last bird you described as black might be one of the color variations of the rough legged and the first a color variation of the red-tailed hawk. The golden eagle has its legs feathered to the claws while the bald headed or white headed has it’s feathers reaching only one-half way.
By the way you need a book on birds that gives table for determining any species in the state. If you will send me the sum of 75 cents, I will send you the book bound in c cloth. I also enclose herewith a statement concerning the Proceedings of the Nebraska Ornithologist’s Union which would be of interest to you.

371-00143c

1904, Dec. 10

DEC 14 Ans’d
Book sent

The State Board of Agriculture
of Delaware

S. H. Messick, Bridgeville, President.
J. T. Shallcross, Middletown, Vice President.
A. W. Slaymaker, Camden, Secretary

Charles J. Pennock,
Ornithologist.

Kennett Square, Pa. 12/10/04

Prof. Lawrence Bruner
Dear Sir –
Replying to your favor of 6 – I enclose 75 cents in P. O. stamps for which please send me a copy of your “Prelim. Review of Neb. Birds” Thanking you for the opportunity I am
Very Truly Yours
C. J. Pennock

State Board of Agriculture
C. J. Pennock
ORNITHOLOGIST
Kennett Square, Pa.
Replying to your

371-00144

1904, Dec. 14

Paul Goss, Sup’t.

The Ord Public Schools

Board of Education:
A. J. Firkinsm President
A. M. Daniels, Vice Pres.
A. E. Charlton, Secretary
N. J. Peterson
Alvin Blessing
Vincent Kokes

Ord, Nebraska, 12/19 1904

Dear Mr. Bruner:-
Please send at once 2 copies of “Birds of Nebraska”. Send the bill to the Board of Education through and it will be allowed the 1st Mon. in Jan.
Resp’t Paul Goss

MAY 1 Ans’d
Dun. DEC 20 Ans’d
Books sent.

371-00145

1904, Dec. 18

D. Nesbit
Telephone:
Office 36 Residence H36

DEC 25 Ans’d

Tekamah, Nebr., Dec 18 1905

Prof. L. Bruner
Lincoln Nebr.
My dear Sir:-
I am preparing a talk for the school children on Protecting the Birds and I write you to get information as to where I may get some reprints ext prepared or put out by the state or U.S. Govt. Will you kindly furnish me with such information – such subjects as migration of birds Birds that eat noxious insects ect.
Thanking you in advance
I remain Yours Respt A.D. Nesbit
Brothers W[illegible] wish to be remembered to you.

371-00147b

1904, Dec. 21

307 Wilder Street
Lowell, Mass.

Dec. 21 St. 1904

Prof. Lawrence Bruner
University of Nebraska.
Lincoln, Neb.

Dear Sir:-
Your favor of the 17th is at hand and I thank you for your courtesy in supplying the information I requested as to when your “Preliminary Review of the Birds of Nebraska” was published, price &c.
Just at this moment I will not order a copy myself, in the face of many regular demands, for publications & periodicals to be met just now, and certain special ones due to sickness in my home.
I would state that for some time I have been deeply interested in the subject of the literature of local botany

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and local bird-lists covering the United States, and where I have been able, by gift, & by purchase when I felt I could, I have tried to collect such literature.
In some cases, such local floras or local (or regional) bird-lists are issued by state experiment stations or by colleges as biological papers &c and a copy can be obtained free upon request. This has led me to be sometimes a little cautious a making a request of this character and sometimes I half [illegible] as if asking for a publication, when I learn later that it is sold only. I regret this has happened in the case of your publication.
I will make a note, on my “bibliography” cards of the price of your list, & may at some future date be glad to order a copy. Yours
R Ernest G. Buttnok.

371-00146b

1904, Dec. 25

Lincoln, Nebr., Dec. 25, 1904.

Dr. A. D. Nesbit:
Takamah, Nebr.
My Dear Sir:-
Yours of the 18th relative to literature on bird protection and relation of bir to agriculture came duly to hand and would have been attended to at once, only I was absent on a railroad Corn Special in southeastern Nebraska and northern Kansas, for the past eight days. If you will write to the Sec. of Agriculture at Washington, and ask for such publications on the subject, they will mail you the same. With best wishes for the holiday season, I remain,
Yours very truly,

371-00147a

1904, Dec. 27

Leander S. Keyser.
108 W. Third Street.
Canal Dover, Ohio.

Author of
“Birds of the Rockies.”
“In Bird Land,” Etc., Etc.

Dec. 27, 1904.

Dec 29 Ans’d

Prof. Lawrence Bruner,
Lincoln, Neb.
My Dear Sir:
On Jan. 29, 1963, you wrote me at Atchison, Kans., of two of your students who had gone to Central America on a collecting trip, to be gone about two years. You also gave me their address. I wrote to them at once, but received no reply. I am still interested in their expedition, and should be glad to have a few lines from you relative to it. Are they still abroad? With what kind of success have they met? Would it be possible to put me in a way to correspond with them in regard to a bird-student’s trip to that country? I shall be greatly obliged if you will take time to reply.
My “Birds of the Rockies” has been reduced to $1.50 postpaid, so that,

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if the University has not yet secured a volume, you might feel like doing so now. The publishers are A. C. McClurg & Co., Chicago. I mention this only because you spoke of it in your letter to me.
Last summer I had a delightful trip into Ontario, where I had a chance to study many of the migrants in their breeding haunts. My observations are being now published in “Our Animal Friends,” Madison Ave. & 26th St., New York City.
I shall be interested in any of your work that you may see fit to call to my notice, as I have known you for many years by reputation.
Very cordially yours,
Leander S Keyser

371-00148b

1904, Dec. 30

Lincoln, Nebr., Dec. 30, 1904.

Leander S. Keyser,
108 W. 3rd St.,
Canal Dover, Ohio.

My Dear Sir:-
Yours of December 27th at hand. Only one of the young men who want to Central America remains in that country and he expects to return in the spring some time before the first of April. In case you wish to write to him you might address Mr. M. A. Carrlker, Jr. in care of the American Consul at Port Limon, C. R.
I note what you say with reference to your Birds of the Rocky Mountains and will mention the fact to our librarian who if he has not already secured a copy may do so now. Since you speak of being interested in any papers from this locality I will simply mention the fact that Wolcott, Swenk and myself have recently published a new work on Nebraska birds which can be had from any of us for 75 cents. in cloth binding.
Yours very truly,

371-00150