All Topics  
Whitney South Seas Expedition

 

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Whitney South Seas Expedition
 
 
  Topics Whitney South Seas Expedition Topic Home

The Whitney South Seas Expedition (1921 - c.1932) to collect bird specimens for the American Museum of Natural History
American Museum of Natural History

The American Museum of Natural History , located on the Upper West Side, Manhattan, New York, USA, is one of the largest and most celebrated museums in the world....
 (AMNH), under the initial leadership of Rollo Beck
Rollo Beck

Rollo Howard Beck was an United States ornithology, bird collector and explorer. Beck's Petrel is named after him....
, was financed by Harry Payne Whitney
Harry Payne Whitney

Harry Payne Whitney was an American businessman, thoroughbred horsebreeder, and member of the prominent Whitney family....
, a thoroughbred
Thoroughbred

The Thoroughbred is a list of horse breeds best known for its use in Thoroughbred horse race. Although the word "thoroughbred" is sometimes used to refer to any breed of purebred horse, it technically refers only to the Thoroughbred breed....
 horse-breeder and philanthropist
Philanthropist

A philanthropist is someone who engages in philanthropy; that is, someone who donates his or her time, money, and/or reputation to charitable organization....
.

Beck, an expert bird collector himself, hired Ernst H. Quayle and Charles Curtis to assist with collecting, including the botanical specimens collected by the expedition.

The expedition visited islands in the south Pacific region and eventually returned with over 40,000 bird
Bird

Birds are wing, Bipedalismal, endothermic , vertebrate animals that lay egg . There are around 10,000 living species, making them the most numerous tetrapod vertebrates....
 specimens, many plant specimens and an extensive collection of anthropological
Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humans and humanity in its totality. Anthropology has origins in the natural sciences, and the humanities. In Great Britain it was originally divided into physical anthropology and cultural anthropology, which itself was divided into archaeology, technology, ethnology and sociology ....
 items and photographs.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Whitney South Seas Expedition'
Start a new discussion about 'Whitney South Seas Expedition'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


The Whitney South Seas Expedition (1921 - c.1932) to collect bird specimens for the American Museum of Natural History
American Museum of Natural History

The American Museum of Natural History , located on the Upper West Side, Manhattan, New York, USA, is one of the largest and most celebrated museums in the world....
 (AMNH), under the initial leadership of Rollo Beck
Rollo Beck

Rollo Howard Beck was an United States ornithology, bird collector and explorer. Beck's Petrel is named after him....
, was financed by Harry Payne Whitney
Harry Payne Whitney

Harry Payne Whitney was an American businessman, thoroughbred horsebreeder, and member of the prominent Whitney family....
, a thoroughbred
Thoroughbred

The Thoroughbred is a list of horse breeds best known for its use in Thoroughbred horse race. Although the word "thoroughbred" is sometimes used to refer to any breed of purebred horse, it technically refers only to the Thoroughbred breed....
 horse-breeder and philanthropist
Philanthropist

A philanthropist is someone who engages in philanthropy; that is, someone who donates his or her time, money, and/or reputation to charitable organization....
.

Beck, an expert bird collector himself, hired Ernst H. Quayle and Charles Curtis to assist with collecting, including the botanical specimens collected by the expedition.

The expedition visited islands in the south Pacific region and eventually returned with over 40,000 bird
Bird

Birds are wing, Bipedalismal, endothermic , vertebrate animals that lay egg . There are around 10,000 living species, making them the most numerous tetrapod vertebrates....
 specimens, many plant specimens and an extensive collection of anthropological
Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humans and humanity in its totality. Anthropology has origins in the natural sciences, and the humanities. In Great Britain it was originally divided into physical anthropology and cultural anthropology, which itself was divided into archaeology, technology, ethnology and sociology ....
 items and photographs. In the course of the expedition Beck sealed the extinction of the already critically endangered Guadalupe Caracara
Guadalupe Caracara

The Guadalupe Caracara, Caracara lutosa or lotusos, is an extinct bird of prey belonging to the falcon family . It was, together with the closely related Crested Caracara and Southern Caracara, formerly placed in the genus Polyborus....
 by shooting nine out of eleven birds seen, almost all of the small population of the species remaining.

Using the 75-ton schooner
Schooner

A schooner is a type of sailing ship characterized by the use of fore-and-aft rig sails on two or more mast s. Schooners were first used by the Netherlands in the 16th or 17th century, and further developed in North America from the early 18th century onwards....
 France, with many different scientists and collectors participating over more than a dozen years, the expedition visited thousands of islands throughout Micronesia
Micronesia

Micronesia , from the Greek language mikros and nesos , is a subregion of Oceania, comprising hundreds of small islands in the Pacific Ocean....
, Polynesia
Polynesia

Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising a large grouping of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean....
 and Melanesia
Melanesia

Melanesia literally means "islands of the black-skinned people". It is a subregion of Oceania extending from the western side of the West Pacific to the Arafura Sea, north and northeast of Australia....
. It was administered by a committee at the AMNH and became a focus for attracting funds for research on the biota of the Pacific islands.

Ernst Mayr replaced Beck as leader on one of the later stages of the expedition, to the Solomon Islands
Solomon Islands

For the group of islands rather than the nation, see Solomon Islands .The Solomon Islands is a country in Melanesia, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands....
 in 1929-1930, and from 1932 to 1953 was Associate Curator, and then Curator, of the Whitney-Rothschild Collection of bird specimens at the AMNH.

External links