Jan., 1916 
PHILADELPHIA TO THE COAST IN EARLY DAYS 
11 
Audubon, or had there been salaried scientific positions in those early days 
by which an ornithologist could make a living, the name of Townsend would 
have been among the leaders in American ornithology. I have talked with 
his cousin who remembers him dressed in the furs and skins that he brought 
from the far west, and with his brother-indaw who knew him in the intimacy 
of family relationship; and I have read the opinions of Cassin in his confi- 
dential letters to Baird and all testify to his high character and ability. 
Townsend filled minor positions at Washington looking after the birds 
of the U. S. Exploring Expedition, and later practiced dentistry in Philadel- 
phia. He seems always to have been handicapped by financial conditions and 
died suddenly on February 6, 1851, at the age of 42. It is deplorable that a 
man of his capabilities could not have been given the opportunities of devel- 
oping them. 
Prior to the appearance of Townsend’s Narrative, two foreign expeditions 
had collected in California. A German explorer then in Mexico, Ferdi- 
nand Deppe, travelled northward to Monterey and went from there to the 
Hawaiian Islands, where, by the way, he met Townsend. He made some collec- 
tions and his ornithological discoveries were published by Lichtenstein in 
1838. They did not amount to much, however, as he secured only one new 
species, the Ferruginous Rough-leg. 
A British expedition under Capt. Beechey (1825) obtained a much larger 
collection which was reported on by Vigors in 1839. The material was actually 
collected by Dr. Collie, Mr. Lay and Lt. Belcher. One hundred species 
were listed (many from Mexico), but the California Jay, Pygmy Nuthatch, 
California Towhee and Red-shafted Flicker, were described as new from 
California. 
This brings us to the next transcontinental expedition, that of William 
Gambel. Gambel was a young protege of Thomas Nuttall. All I have been 
able to learn of his ancestry was that he lived in Philadelphia with his mother 
and sister who were in humble circumstances. He later had some sort of 
occupation at the Academy of Natural Sciences, and in 1842 (Cassin says 1841) 
at the solicitation of Nuttall, he made a journey to California with a party of 
trappers. He took a more southerly route than any of the previous parties, 
following the Santa Fe trail, exploring the Raton Mountains of northern New 
Mexico and passing thence from Santa Fe to the Colorado River and into 
southren California. He returned round the Horn reaching Philadelphia with 
his treasures in August, 1845. 
The new species which Gambel discovered included the Wren-tit, in many 
ways one of the most remarkable birds of the coast, Plain Titmouse, Mountain 
Chickadee, California Thrasher, Gambel’s Quail, Elegant Tern, and Nuttall’s 
Woodpecker. Diagnoses of some of his new species were sent from the west to 
Nuttall and published before Gambel’s return. His final report, a fully anno- 
tated list of 176 species, is the first paper of note on Californian ornithology 
and forms the basis of all subsequent work. Gambel and his specimens reached 
Philadelphia about August 15, 1845, and Cassin, writing to Baird on this date, 
says: “Gambel is here with his California birds and others — not very many 
but some of the most magnificent specimens I ever saw. He has four new 
species in addition to those already described : a queer little Parus crested but 
totally distinct from bicolor ; another which he calls Parus but is hardly of that 
genus more like Setopkaga; an extraordinarily large long billed bird which he 
