For two weeks in July 1948, Australian mail carried a humanitarian message: GIVE A DAY UNITED NATIONS APPEAL FOR CHILDREN. This postal slogan promoted UNICEF’s first global fundraising campaign to help children impacted by WWII. Full story here... tinyurl.com/48bx7md2 #philately

3/3) Over his lifetime William Serle (1912-92) published 65 ornithological scientific articles and books; sixty dealing with birds of Africa. His best-known work is the 1977 book A Field Guide to the Birds of West Africa, co-authored with G.J. Morel and illustrated by Wolfgang Hartwig.

2/3) William Serle travelled to Africa in 1937 as a medical doctor, living 20 years in Nigeria and Cameroon. In 1957 he returned to Scotland to become a minister. He was ordained in 1959 and made minister of Drumoak Church, where he served 28 years and to where this Cameroon cover was addressed.

1/3) This c.1949, philatelically-inspired cover from Niamey, Niger, addressed to Miss. Serle at 64 Strathearn Rd, Edinburgh, was likely sent by the Scottish doctor and ornithologist William Serle, who was listed at this address in 1950s editions of IBIS and the BOC Bulletin. #ornithology #philately

8. Jane Koch by Rembrandt Peale (1817)

3/3) Emerson was both an ornithologist and a landscape painter. He served the COC twice as president, and his painting of a Condor adorned the cover of the COC's journal, the Bulletin of the Cooper Ornithological Club of California, which from 1900 (Vol. 2), was renamed The Condor.

2/3) The 1¢ Grant postal card, addressed to Emerson at his home in Haywards, California, is from William Dutcher (1846-1920) in his capacity as AOU Treasurer. Emerson had joined the AOU as an associate member in 1885. Dutcher writes seeking a reply to an earlier letter sent 25 May.

1/3) The Cooper Ornithological Club (COC) was founded 133 years ago today, on 22 June 1893. One week later, this postal card was sent to William Otto Emerson (1856-1940), a founding member of the club, and of its forerunner, the California Ornithological Club. #ornithology #philately

3/3) Even ordinary stamps served the scheme. Skovgaard enclosed 100 used stamps with his letters, each carrying a message in Danish (pic), English, German, French or Spanish asking finders of ringed birds to report them to him. Recipients were asked to distributed them among friends & acquaintances.

2/3) Skovgaard (1887-1972), pictured, manufactured his own aluminium bird rings, but obtaining metal was not always easy. He therefore reached an agreement with a supplier interested in stamps: aluminium in exchange for the more unusual postage stamps received on letters reporting ringed birds.

1/3) #Ornithology and #philately collide with Danish ornithologist Peter Skovgaard. In 1920 he founded Dansk Ornithologisk Central (DOC) and the journal Danske Fugle, launching a bird-ringing scheme that eventually marked over 256,000 birds. He sent this 1943 DOC cover to his nephew Roland.

2/3) Four years later, he found himself on another historic voyage: helping transport the descendants of the Bounty mutineers to Norfolk Island aboard a ship commanded by a tyrannical captain.

1/3) In 1852, a fifteen-year-old boy left Cornwall carrying a newly issued midshipman's ticket. His first voyage took place on the pioneering first official mail service between Britain and Australia by steamship. #philately #history #Australia

(3/3) Notable on this numbered cover (No. 412) is the message in red to the Post Master stating that “This package is of value” and, if undelivered, the sender must be notified. Lattin cites Section 675 of the US Postal Laws & Regulations, requiring the return of packages deemed of “obvious value.”

(2/3) Fisher resided at the Bolton Street address during the mid-1900s before moving to Calvert Street by 1910. He joined the American Ornithologists' Union in 1895 and contributed to publications including Lattin's The Oölogist, in which his portrait (shown here) appeared in the April 1895 issue.

(1/3) It's May 10, so here's a 10 May 1905 cover sent by the natural history dealer Frank Haak Lattin to William H. Fisher at 1318 Bolton Street, Baltimore, Maryland. This was the stockbroker William Harmanus Fisher Sr., a pioneer Maryland ornithologist and bird photographer. #ornithology #philately

My essay this month looks at covers as traces of human thought. A 1938 Hong Kong cover forms a case study onto past lives. open.substack.com/pub/stampden... #philately #history

(3/3) As part of this drive to build MCZ holdings, Verrill joined a small team in 1862–63 sent by Agassiz to the Smithsonian to secure specimens. A long-term future at the MCZ seemed all but certain, until disputes in 1863 led him to resign. In 1864, he become the first professor of zoology at Yale.

(2/3) Verrill had been appointed, while still a Harvard student, by MCZ founder Louis Agassiz to oversee and develop the museum's nascent bird collection. In the 1862 annual report, Verrill reported that the holdings had increased by 2,274 specimens representing more than 450 species.

(1/3) This 3c postal stationery cover, postmarked Washington D.C., 21 May 1863, is addressed to Addison Emery Verrill at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ). A Smithsonian Institution handstamp at top left marks it as a trace of MCZ efforts to build its collection. #ornithology #philately

Addressed to Archibald Montgomery Low (1888–1956) at the family home. It may be from his father, an engineer who moved to Australia as a director of a gold mine. This letter card was posted the year after Archie’s 1896 visit to Australia. Archie later developed the first powered drone aircraft.

(2/2) Founded in Melbourne on 1 July 1901, the RAOU gained “Royal” status in 1910 from King George V. Its first Official Checklist of the Birds of Australia appeared in 1913. The updated, second edition was published in the same year of this cover... 1926.

(1/2) A 6 Dec 1926 cover from the Royal Australasian Ornithologists’ Union to Bradshaw Hall Swales (1875-1928), Honorary Assistant Curator of Birds at the U.S. National Museum. Swales became Honorary Custodian of birds’ eggs in 1918, advancing to his curatorial role in 1921. #ornithology #philately

In Nov 1883, Charles Aiken of Aiken's Free Museum in Colorado Springs, needed a taxidermist. In this podcast we explore his recruitment methods, the intersection between commerce & science, and how Aiken became a pioneer of #ornithology in Colorado. open.substack.com/pub/stampden... #philately

(2/3) Forbush was writing to seek information regarding Goshawks killed on Fisher’s Island, possibly in connection to his three-part magnum opus "Birds of Massachusetts and Other New England States." In 1926 he was completing Vol. II, noting his Goshawk account as written in Nov 1926.

(1/3) In Dec 1926, this postcard travelled from Boston to the natural history dealers Angel & Cash in Providence, Rhode Island, signed by (or on behalf of) Edward Howe Forbush (1858-1929), Director of the Division of Ornithology at the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture. #ornithology #philately

Another philatelic article is now available on my Substack. Inbetween my monthly written articles, I release social #philately podcasts. open.substack.com/pub/stampden...

(3/3) In the same month our cover is dated (June 1897), Prof. Braun was advertising Pine Grosbeak eggs in sets in the ornithological journal The Osprey, sourced from 20 captive breeding pairs. You could buy a live pair too! This cover likely marks the source of the eggs in the Lewis collection.

(2/3) J. Parker Lewis and his son were keen oologists. In a privately printed catalogue of their collection, dated 1 January 1894, they list 573 species, 5,002 sets, 20,388 eggs, yet no Pine Grosbeak! However, a pencilled Dec 1897 amendment to the list shows Pine Grosbeak eggs now in the collection.

(1/3) June 1897 cover sent to J. Parker Lewis, 723 Walnut St, Philadelphia, from natural history dealer Prof. Carl Braun of Bangor, Maine. The manuscript note on the front: “Re – Pine Grosbeaks" points to a very specific collecting transaction. #ornithology #philately