CHAPTER X 

 Notes of a Vanished Industry 



I have corresponded with many men who were actively interested in 

 hunting and observing the Passenger Pigeon when its flocks still numbered 

 uncounted millions of birds. Some of the data supplied in kind response 

 to my queries is in the form of hastily jotted notes, which, when they are 

 brought together, include more or less repetition of personal experiences. 

 They have a certain value, however, when taken en masse, for they are the 

 testimony of eye-witnesses who will soon be gone, after which the Pas- 

 senger Pigeon will become as much a matter of written history and tradition 

 as the auk or the buffalo. 



I am under obligation to Mr. Henry T. Phillips, of Detroit, for much 

 practical information regarding the capture of pigeons, and the business of 

 marketing them as he knew it in those earlier days. There follows a 

 portion of a letter written me by Mr. Phillips in October, 1904. — W. B. M. 



I AM In receipt of your letter asking for informa- 

 tion about the wild pigeon, but I do not know 

 that I can be of much benefit to you, though I will 

 give you what information I can. 



I began business in Cheboygan, Mich., in May, 

 1862, as a dealer in groceries and produce and added 

 the commission business a little later, as I was fond of 

 shooting, and I began advertising the sale of game. I 

 have been credited by dealers in New York with being 

 the largest shipper of venison in the United States. In 

 1864 (I think it was) I had a shipment of live wild 

 pigeons which we brought down the Cheboygan River 



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