THE MAKING OF I!lKl)f>RAFT SANCTUARY IL 



(EDITORIAL BV FRANK M. CHAPMAN IN BIRDLORE) 



A visit to Birdcraft Sanctuary lias so imijrcssed us with its 

 possibilities that we cannot resist the impulse to add a word to 

 the account of this unique undertaking which Mrs. Wright gives 

 on a preceding page. While this sanctuary has been developed 

 primarily as a refuge for wild birds, a local museum and a home 

 for the State Audubon Society, it is chiefly valuable to our mind 

 as an object lesson in conservation and museum methods. 



As a "museum man" we have had constantly before us for 

 the past 25 years the problem of conveying a knowledge of l)ird 

 life to the public through the exhibition of specimens. In the 

 light of this experience we do not hesitate to say that, in its own 

 field of local bird life, Birdcraft Sanctuary promises to render 

 a greater and moi-e effective return for the capital invested than 

 can be shown by any other museum in this country. We cannot 

 say by any similar institution, far ire kiioir of voiie lil-p if. 



Combined with a museum, which contains an exhibit de- 

 signed to interest the casual observer by its attractiveness, as 

 well as to fill the wants of the students, we have an outdoor 

 Aviary walled only by a protecting fence and roofed l)y the sky, 

 where many of the birds examined in the museum cases may l3e 

 seen and heard in a series of natural Habitat Groups which no 

 preparator may hope to ecpial. And botli in-door and out-door 

 exhibits are under the constant care of a Curator-Warden ready 

 to supply information in a way with which no printed label can 

 ever comfjete — so much more convincing is the spoken word 

 than the pi'inted word. Ten aci-es cannot harl)or many birds 

 nor a little museum in the country ))e seen liy a large number of 

 people — as figures go now-a-days but the idea which they em- 

 body can reach to the ends of the earth. So we repeat our lie- 

 lief that Birdcraft Sanctuary will eventually give refuge to 

 birds on many thousand acres and the beauty and value of 

 bird-life to many generations of bird students. 



(From Birdlore, Aug. 1915) 



