Ray Zimmerman's Blog, page 4

The Great Naturalists

The Great Naturalists
Edited by Robert Huxley
Reviewed by Ray Zimmerman

Robert Huxley took on a monumental task when he agreed to edit this volume, which is as much a history of science as natural history. The collection of essays includes an impressive list of authors, professors of history and science, curators and other notables. Each contributor devoted three to seven pages to one naturalist.

The Age of enlightenment section gave many familiar names, such as Catesby, Bartram, Linnaeus, and Lamarck. Georg Steller sailed east from Kamchatka and described the Steller’s Jay, confirming Russia’s claim to Alaska, is among those described.

Alexander von Humboldt, John James Audubon, Alfred Russell Wallace, Charles Darwin, and Asa Gray are among those featured in the 19th century portion.

The section titled, “The Ancients,” included Aristotle, who described the feeding mechanism of the sea urchin, a structure known today as “Aristotle’s Lantern.” Theophrastus, known as the founder of botany, and Pliny the Elder, whose Historia Naturalis ran to 160 volumes are also included.

Robert Huxley, editor, served as Head of Collections in the Botany Department of the Museum of Natural History at London. He is retired from that post but continues as a consultant and writer

The Tennessee State Flower

A note from my ongoing research on Robert Sparks Walker, Poet and Literary Naturalist.

1924 Walker, Robert Sparks, “The Tennessee State Flower,” Tennessee Historical Society. Tennessee Historical Magazine. Nashville, The Society, 1924. [Series I] V. 8. N. 2 P 146-147.
The Tennessee State Library and Archives
Knox County Library, Knoxville, TN

On October 13, 2019 the author examined and photocopied the article as found in a bound copy of the journal at the reading room of the Tennessee State Library and Archives, Nashville, Tennessee. Within the article, Walker described the state flower botanically as well as its symbolism.

At the time, the Passionflower was the state flower. It has since been replaced by the Iris but remains a symbol of Tennessee as the State Wildflower. Interestingly, Walker described the flower as a Christian symbol with parts of the flower standing for aspects of the Good Friday passion of the Christ. A list of the State Flowers of all states, as excerpted from the magazine Southern Fruit Grower, follows the article.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Wall

This is the third of three poems published in the literary journal Number One, earlier this year.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Wall

1.Robert frost and his neighbor repair their stone wall boundary.
The neighbor declares the results good.
Frost contemplates a new poem.

2. Migrating Red-winged Blackbirds impale themselves
on slats erected along the U.S – Mexico border.
The Department of Homeland Security
declares the nation safe from blackbirds.

3. Manchu invaders encounter the Great Wall of China;
proceed with their war of conquest.

4. Thanks to the popular band, Pink Floyd,
we are all just bricks in the wall.

5. President Ronald Reagan stands on Berlin Soil,
says, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”

6. President Thomas Jefferson assures
the Baptist committee of Danbury, Connecticut
that they will be free to worship as they see fit
and not subject to regulation by the Calvinist majority.
He proclaims a wall of separation between church and state.

7. Presidential candidate Donald Trump promises
to build a wall along the Mexican border;
fails to mention that construction began years ago.

8. Three Little Pigs build walls of straw, sticks, and brick.
Big Bad Wolf holds barbeque.
The third pig declines the invitation.

9. The Speaker of the House refuses to let the President
address the nation from the house chambers,
There must be a wall enforcing the separation of powers.

10. Jesus extols the value of building walls on rock foundations
advises against building on sand.

11. The descendants of Isaac gather at the Western Wall;
offer prayers and lamentations:
hope for the rebuilding of the Temple.

12. Followers of Mohammed gather within the walls
of the Dome of the Rock;
Pray for preservation of the mosque.

13. Hacker interface penetrates firewalls at will,
takes down Fortune 500 web sites.

For the Last Carolina Parakeet

Also published in the literary journal Number One, Gallatin, Tennessee, 2019 edition.

For the Last Carolina Parakeet

I imagine the loneliness of your aviary
there at the Cincinnati Zoo where your
predecessor, the last Passenger Pigeon,
flew off to oblivion just a few years earlier.
One voice is not a choir.

You were part of a social species,
descending by the thousands,
on fields to consume cockleburs,
or orchards for luscious fruits.
One voice is not a choir.

Some labelled you a pest
and pursued with shotguns.
Audubon noticed your species
in decline even in his bygone days.
One voice is not a choir.

No welcoming song of your fellows
greeted your waning days. Does your
skin adorn a museum, just as your
ancestors’ feathers adorned ladys’ hats?
On voice is not a choir.

It saddens me to think my adopted home
of Tennessee once knew the calls and colors
of a native parrot. One scientist titled
an article about your kin, “Forever Gone.”
No voices remain in the choir.

Father

This poem appeared in the literary journal Number One, Gallatin, Tennessee, earlier this year. It is dedicated to my father, Harry W. Zimmerman, who served in Europe, World War II and is buried in the National Cemetery, Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Father

When the grandpa I never knew abandoned you and your family,
your mother parted ways with reality,
ended her days in the loving arms of madness.

At the orphanage you held your sister’s hand
when she wouldn’t stop crying.
You eased her nightly tears until sleep came.

When you discovered she was gone, you had to ask where.
Oh, “She was adopted,” was the caretaker’s offhand reply,
Perhaps they thought goodbyes would make things worse.

You were a hard man forged by hard times, and silent.
Sometimes you were as absent as your missing sister.

I remember visiting mom’s youngest sister.
My cousins took turns riding their horse.
I took a turn and couldn’t stay on.

You made that old nag trot like a thoroughbred.
Everyone said, that man can really sit a horse.

In your senile years you liked to go for Sunday drives.
Every time you saw horses you pleaded with me to
get you a job there. “I could still work horses,” your said.

Once you leaned against a rail and whinnied like a horse.
They trotted to you as if coming to one of their own,
like mares to a stallion.

Southern Fruit Grower

My research on Chattanooga author and naturalist Robert Sparks Walker took me to the Tennessee State Library and Archives to examine some materials available there. Here is a bit of that story.

Either Walker or someone close to him was a meticulous keeper of scrapbooks. The Tennessee State Library and Archives holds the Southern Fruit Grower Scrapbook, a collection of correspondence Walker received between 1910 and 1917 as publisher and editor of said magazine. The Chattanooga Public Library has two scrapbooks of Walker's articles on the Brainerd Mission. Mary Bell Fisher mentions having examined “The Walker Scrapbooks,” in her Thesis for the Master of Arts Degree at Peabody College of Education.

1910 – 1917 Walker, Robert Sparks, Southern Fruit Grower Scrapbook, Archival Materials,

On October 13, 2019 the author examined the only copy of this document in a restricted area at the Tennessee State Library and Archives in Nashville, Tennessee. A guard provided the author with a key to a locker for storage since no pens, cameras, cell phones or extraneous items are permitted in the archival portion of the library. The author was permitted to bring in a mechanical pencil. The archivist provided a pair of white cotton gloves to wear while examining the document and loose-leaf paper for notes, one sheet at a time.

The scrapbook consists of correspondence Robert Sparks Walker received relevant to his role as editor and publisher of the Southern Fruit Grower magazine. The letters offered thanks for copies received as well as accolades stating how the magazine had benefited the recipients in business. A few included subscription renewals. Many from government agencies stated the value of the magazine for agriculture and horticulture in their respective states. Those from academic institutions stated its value for their students. Most were typed on letterhead stationery. A few were handwritten on stationery and some on lined paper.

Walker acquired 50% ownership of the magazine in 1900 and served as editor and publisher until he sold his interest in 1921. For further information on the years Walker spent editing Southern Fruit Grower, consult the early chapters of Robert Sparks Walker: The Unconventional life of an East Tennessee Naturalist by Alexandra Walker Clark.

A list of just a few of the correspondents whose letters are preserved in this scrapbook follows:
U. S. Department of Agriculture, C.B. Bracket, Pomologist
Luther Burbank
South Carolina Agricultural Experiment Station
The Commonwealth of Virginia, State Crop Pest Commission
The University of Kentucky, Agricultural Experiment Station
The University of Tennessee, Experiment Station
Georgia Experiment Station
The Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institution

The Naturalist

The Naturalist
Darrin Lunde
Review by Ray Zimmerman

The biography is subtitled Theodore Roosevelt, a Lifetime of Exploration and the Triumph of American Natural History. Author Darrin Lunde is himself a distinguished museum naturalist, working at the American Museum of Natural History. He presents not the Roosevelt of policy and politics, or even San Juan Hill, but Roosevelt the naturalist.

Within the pages of The Naturalist, Lunde informs the reader of how eight-year-old Teddy obtained the heard of a seal, discarded by a shopkeeper, in order to prepare the skull for display. By age twelve he was already preparing study skins for a small museum in a spare room in his parents’ home. He viewed the family vacation in the Adirondacks and later travels in Egypt as “collecting trips” where he spent his mornings obtaining and preparing specimens. He later chose Harvard University, primarily because it included a museum founded by Agassiz.

These details may put off modern readers, but the setting of the nonfiction book is a time when scientific research on living things depended on museum specimens. Every new plant species was likely named from a pressed specimen and larger animals from study skins and skulls. Museums included drawers of pined insects and other preserved invertebrates. References to species by Latin name sometimes included the location of the type specimen, the one examined by the scientist or naturalist who named them.

Lunde devotes one chapter to a vignette on the development of natural history museums. He names curators and naturalists who became Roosevelt’s role models. These included an uncle, Robert Barnwell Roosevelt, who wrote a book on upland game birds and John Bell who assisted John James Audubon on his western expeditions. Bell prepared specimens for Audubon to draw for his final book, The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America. He also taught young Teddy the art of taxidermy at his shop in New York.

Young Roosevelt was also present at the founding meeting of the American Museum of Natural History, organized by his father, Theodore Roosevelt, Senior. The meeting took place in the family living room. Aside from the funders, those in attendance included the first curator and director of that museum, Albert S. Bickmore. Roosevelt was also aware of the work of Spencer Fullerton Baird, the founding curator of the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History.

The preceding words sum up the first of three sections of the book. A peek ahead reveled that Lunde takes the reader through Roosevelt’s years as a conservationist-hunter and ends with the big game safari in Africa, organized primarily to provide specimens for the Smithsonian. Aside from providing a unique view of an American President, Lunde captures the spirit of the early days of Museum work. These days are not entirely gone. Though museum naturalists now pay greater attention to the impact of their work, preserved specimens are still important to scientific research today.

Robert Sparks Walker: Literary Naturalist

I have been working on a bibliography of books by and about Robert Sparks Walker (1878 - 1960) while preparing a living history reenactment of him as a character. At the celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Chattanooga Audubon Society, I performed the reenactment and distributed a handout modified from the front matter. a copy follows.

Robert Sparks Walker
Literary Naturalist
Prepared by Ray Zimmerman

Robert Sparks Walker is best known as the founder of the Chattanooga Audubon Society and for his foresight in setting aside their Elise Chapin Wildlife Sanctuary, popularly known as Audubon Acres. Chattanooga Audubon’s acquisition of the Maclellan Island property during Walker’s lifetime is sometimes added as a brief footnote to that achievement. His literary career began 44 years before the founding of Chattanooga Audubon but is rarely mentioned. The author hopes to preserve a record of Walker’s achievements as a poet, editor, publisher and author, and to provoke new interest his published works.

Brief Biographical Sketch

Robert Sparks Walker (1878-1960), was born in the log cabin on his father’s farm, the property now known as Audubon Acres, and is buried near the cabin, with his wife Sarah Elberta Clark (1892 -1924) and son Robert Sparks Walker, Jr (1907 – 1915). Robert Sparks Walker and Elberta Clark were married in 1904. Elberta’s death made Walker the single parent of their second son, Wendell Clark Walker (1909 – 1988), then aged fourteen years. In 1960, Walker suffered a heart attack while leading a nature walk on the Audubon Acres property. He was taken to his home where he received medical care. He died the following day at age 82.

Significance as a Writer

Robert Sparks Walker began writing freelance articles while still in high school. He acquired fifty percent ownership of the Southern Fruit Grower magazine in 1900. He served as editor and publisher of that magazine until its sale in 1921. He served as Nature Editor of Flower Grower 1923 – 1934 and had a weekly nature column in the Chattanooga Times beginning in 1933.

His first published book, Anchor Poems, appeared in 1925, followed by a second book of verse, My Fathers Farm, in 1927. Walker had a growing reputation as an author and editor when, at age 53, he published Torchlights to the Cherokees (Macmillan, 1931). The Pulitzer Prize nomination for that book accelerated his career. He spent several weeks examining relevant materials in the files of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (Andover-Harvard Theological Library) to complete Torchlights to the Cherokees.

Walker followed Torchlights to the Cherokees with a novel, a collection of short stories, two additional books of poetry, and a series of booklets promoting the City of Chattanooga and economic growth in the city and the surrounding area. He returned to book length nonfiction with Lookout: The Story of a Mountain which begins with the geology of the mountain and continues through human habitation.

In 1955 he published As the Indians Left It which includes charming stories of childhood life on the farm and documents the early days of the Chattanooga Audubon Society and the sanctuary. Local historians have disputed his statements about the history of the property and the log cabin, and artifacts related to Native American occupation of the land, but not Walker’s significance as a conservationist and author. The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation gives an annual award for lifetime achievement in conservation which is named the Robert sparks Walker Award.

Walker also hosted a weekly radio show. He produced “illustrated slide talks,” loaned to schools and civic groups, and helped produce at least one nature film.

His final book was a revised edition of State Flowers and State Birds: Being an Authentic Record of the Official Birds and Flowers of all the States of America, Litchfield, Illinois, Sunshine Press. Revised edition 1960, The original (1950) volume does not include Alaska and Hawaii since they had not achieved statehood at the time. It includes a state flower poem and a state bird poem for each of the then 48 states. Birds adopted by multiple states have a separate poem for each state. The 1960 edition includes Alaska, and Hawaii. According to the publisher, the revised edition is the last book written during Walker’s lifetime. He died after sending the revised edition, possibly before it went to press.

I also performed the reenactment twice at the 75th anniversary event. A videotape of a portion of the reenactment filmed in front of his birthplace appears here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffQcc...

Ends of the Earth

Excerpt from my article on the works of Peter Matthiessen published in The Helbender Press
July/August 2006. I mentioned three new nonfiction works:

Perhaps the most significant of the three is End of the Earth: Voyages to Antarctica. In this gem Matthiessen describes two voyages to Antarctica, one departing from Tierra del Fuego, and the other from Tasmania. The book includes historical vignettes on polar exploration, whaling and sealing. He includes information on many polar explorers; Nansen, Amundsen, Shakleton, Ross, Scott, and others. He also describes first hand encounters with Antarctic wildlife and descriptions of research stations, wrecked ships, and abandoned outposts, especially the one at South Georgia Island.

He contrasts the luxury he and his fellow travelers experience on board the vessel Kapitan Khlebnikov with the hardships suffered by early explorers. End of the Earth is a complete book on the Antarctic. It includes extensive discussion of current and past threats to Antarctic wildlife and the environmental quality in the region.

Matthiessen’s voyages to Antarctica took place during the 1990’s. During that same decade, he was traveling world-wide with wildlife biologists and documenting their research on the several species of cranes found worldwide and researching the worldwide population of tigers. Two nonfiction books grew out of these travels, The Birds of Heaven, and Tigers in the Snow. Each is a delightful read and includes historical insights into human interactions with these creatures.

Matthiessen has been called America’s greatest Natural History writer in the literary tradition. I certainly place him among the best and hope that he will give us more insights into wild nature and exhortations to preserve the world’s wildlife and the landscape in which it lives.

New Project

This is the first page of a project I am developing for the Chattanooga Audubon Society.

Introduction

This work is an annotated list of materials the author encountered while learning about the historic figure, Robert Sparks Walker (1878-1960), founder of the Chattanooga Audubon Society. Walker began writing freelance articles before graduating from high school. He was born in the log cabin on his father’s farm, the property now known as Audubon Acres, and is buried, with his wife, Elberta and son Robert, near the cabin. Robert junior. died at eight years of age. Robert Sparks Walker and Elberta were married in 1904 and she died in 1924. This made Robert Sparks Walker the single parent of Wendell Clark Walker, then aged fourteen years.

At age 22, he acquired fifty percent ownership of the Southern Fruit Grower magazine in 1900 and edited that publication until 1921. He served as Nature Editor of Flower Grower 1923 – 1934 and had a weekly nature column in the Chattanooga Times beginning in 1933.

His first published book, Anchor Poems, appeared in 1925. Walker had a growing reputation as an author and editor when, at age 53, he published Torchlights to the Cherokees (Macmillan, 1931). The Pulitzer Prize nomination for that book accelerated his career. He spent several weeks examining relevant materials in the files of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (Andover-Harvard Theological Library) to complete Torchlights to the Cherokees.

Later in his life, Walker hosted a weekly radio show. He produced “illustrated slide talks,” loaned to schools and civic groups, and helped produce at least one nature film.

The author, Ray Zimmerman, searched the data base of the Chattanooga Public Library and the stacks of the Local History Department thereof. The librarians were gracious and helpful. The “Ask a Librarian” feature of the Tennessee State Library and Archives web page revealed a wealth of information at that institution. The author also examined some of the materials available at Audubon Acres.

Finally, the author used the web site https://www.worldcat.org to search for materials in other libraries. Since many of the works are out of print, each entry includes a list of libraries where they are available. The author organized the list by date in order to establish a timeline for the works.

Published books by Robert Sparks Walker form the primary focus of this work. A complete description of the thousands of magazine and newspaper articles, personal papers and correspondence is beyond its scope, though a few particularly significant such works are included. A few secondary sources by Mary Bell Fisher, E. Raymond Evans, Wyman R. Greene and Andra Walker Moscowitz (writing as Alexandra Walker Clark) are included.