2 Spencer Fuller ton Baird. [Junuury 



detail a history of the principal events and chief results of his 

 life, together with a complete bibliography of his publications. 

 Since the present memoir is intended to deal more particularly 

 with Professor Baird as an ornithologist, the reader is referred 

 for more general information to Professor Goode's admirable 

 ' Biographical Sketch,' * from which are taken most of the 

 chronological data and the occasional quotations in the follow- 

 ing prelude to what I have to offer from my own personal 

 knowledge of the life, labors, attainments, and personal qualities 

 of one who in history must hold a place at the head of American 

 naturalists, and in the hearts of those who knew him a place 

 which none other can fill. 



Spencer Fullerton Baird was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, 

 February 2, 1823. In 1834 he was sent to a Quaker boarding 

 school at Port Deposit, Maryland, and the following year to the 

 Reading Grammar School. In 1837 ^^^ entered Dickinson Col- 

 lege, graduating in 1S40, at the age of seventeen. The next 

 several years were spent in making natural history studies, and 

 in the study of medicine, including a winter's course of lectures 

 at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, in New York, in 

 1842, though he never formally completed his medical course. 

 "In 1845 he was chosen professor of natural history in Dickin- 

 son College, and in 1846 his duties and emoluments were in- 

 creased by election to the chair of natural history and chemistry 

 in the same institution. . . . July 5, 1850, he accepted the posi- 

 tion of Assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, and 

 October 3, at the age of twenty-seven years, he entered upon his 

 life work in connection with that foundation — 'the increase and 

 diffusion of knowledge among men.'" 



Mr. Goode informs us that "his ancestry upon one side was 

 English, upon the other Scotch and German. His paternal 

 grandfather was Samuel Baird, of Pottstown, Pa., a surveyor by 

 profession, whose wife was Rebecca Potts." The Bairds were 

 from Scotland, while the Potts family came from England to 

 Pennsylvania at the close of the seventeenth century. "His great 



* Forming a special chapter of the work before cited, and divided into nine distinct 

 sections, as follows: I. Outline of his public career. II. Honors and dignities. 

 III. Ancestry and development of character. IV. Early friendships and their influ- 

 ences. V. Analysis of his work and the results. VI. Contributions to science and 

 scientific literature. VII. Educational and administrative works. VIII. Work as 

 Commissioner of Fisheries, IX. Epilogue. 



