Details - Theodore Roosevelt letter to Elliott L. Coues

Theodore Roosevelt letter to Elliott L. Coues

Title

Theodore Roosevelt letter to Elliott L. Coues

By

Roosevelt, Theodore, 1858-1919

Baird, Spencer Fullerton, 1823-1887
Coues, Elliott, 1842-1899
New York (State). Legislature. Assembly.
Smithsonian Institution

Type

Book

Material

Archival material

Publication info

Notes

Letter handwritten in ink by T. Roosevelt from Albany, New York, on stationery with the engraved letterhead of the State of New York Assembly Chamber, to naturalist Elliott L. Coues in Washington, D.C.

Coues has written a brief note in the space left blank by Roosevelt at the end of the letter on p. [4]: "Respectfully referred to Professor Baird, with references to the proposition marked with red pencil. Please return suggestive reply, if any. Elliott Coues." There are red pencil check marks and blue underlinings on the passage of the letter asking whether the Smithsonian might be interested in receiving Roosevelt's collection of bird skins. The marks were presumably added by Coues to bring this passage to the attention of Spencer F. Baird.

Roosevelt asks Coues for assistance in obtaining information on American shrews to help identify the specimens Roosevelt had collected in Maine and elsewhere. Roosevelt also offers his collection of a few hundred bird skins to the Smithsonian, including some he obtained while in Egypt and Syria.

Elliott Coues (1842-1899), a disciple of Spencer F. Baird, was probably the most influential American ornithologist of his generation. From about 1860 to 1881 Coues served in the United States Army as Assistant Surgeon and from 1877 to 1886 served as Professor of Anatomy at Columbian College (now The George Washington University). His major publications include Key to North American Birds, 1872; Check List of North American Birds, 1873, 1882; and Field Ornithology, 1874.