Reports of Field Agents 433 



REPORT OF MRS. W. T. WILSON, FIELD AGENT 

 FOR INDIANA 



Receiving the appointment of Field Agent of the National Association of 

 Audubon Societies on March 6, I began at once the work of organizing Junior 

 Societies bv sending out letters to the superintendents of various schools 

 throughout the state, and also getting into touch with Superintendent J. G. 

 CoUicott of the Indianapolis public schools in order that I might properly 

 reach the pupils of the grade schools. The replies to my letters came promptly 

 and were very favorable. There seemed to be a wave of interest in bird-study, 

 and as soon as it was learned that a lecturer would come at an appointed time 

 I was besieged with applications for talks. Very shortly every possible date 

 up to June 6, the close of the season, was taken, and had there been time many 

 other engagements could have been filled. 



I had expected at first to spend the greater part of the time in the smaller 

 cities of the state, but the plan of introducing the work of the Audubon Society 

 in the city schools was so enthusiastically entered into by Superintendent CoUi- 

 cott and Miss Rousseau McClellan, head of the nature-study work, that I could 

 have spent every day of the three months in the sixty-six grade schools of this 

 city. But I had already planned to visit and speak in the public schools of War- 

 saw, Winona, Bluffton, Michigan City, Rushville, Brazil, and Bedford, and these 

 engagements were filled. The demand in the local schools was so great that 

 every day not otherwise engaged was immediately spoken for. The last lecture 

 was given on the last day of school. Between March 6 and June 6, I gave 

 seventy-five lectures, many of them illustrated by stereopticon slides, reach- 

 ing a total of 18,960 pupils and teachers. The first lecture, in School No. 2 in 

 this city, was before an audience of 350, and a class of 398 was formed in the 

 building, many children joining who were not privileged to hear the talk. In 

 School No. 32 I spoke, with stereopticon slides, before a fine audience of 700 

 children, and the aftermath was a Junior Class of 321 pupils. 



Wherever bird-talks were given there was the most intense interest in the 

 work of the Audubon Society and all that it stands for; although, owing to 

 purely local conditions in some of the districts, the response was not always 

 what it should have been in the organization of Junior Classes. 



In every town I visited I made it a point to reach every pupil in school 

 that day; and even if societies have not been organized in the numbers that 

 they might have been, interest in the life and protection of birds has been so 

 awakened that much good must result, not only for the birds but for the boys 

 and girls who have been taught to safeguard the life of every bird. 



Wherever I have talked I have started this slogan among the children: 

 "Save the birds," and it has had most beneficial results. I have had many 

 letters from boys and girls telling me of specific instances where they have been 

 able to save a bird's life. One boy wrote me, "I have saved a bird;" and he 



