Digitization projects often shed light on stories hidden in plain sight. This is the story of a husband-and-wife team that served as field collectors for the American Museum of Natural History from 1912–1945¹. They were American immigrants who came from humble beginnings, dreamt of a new life, and found one.

•     •     •

José and Virginia Correia are one of history’s most prolific bird collecting teams. For over three decades, they participated in many scientific exploring expeditions for the American Museum of Natural History, including the Whitney South Sea Expedition from 1922 to 1926.²

Although the published literature is scant regarding their scientific contributions, their story is certainly worth telling. Described by The Standard-Times (New Bedford) as a “life reading like fiction”,³  their work has emerged from obscurity with the digitization of José’s field notes from the Whitney South Sea Expedition (1920–1941) as part of the BHL Field Notes Project funded by the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR). Now audiences far and wide can enjoy this quintessential American story of two immigrants propelled by fate, hard work, and a sincere desire to improve one’s lot in life.

From José’s journal entries, we learn what daily life for a field collector was really like. Traveling to exotic locales, encountering Indigenous cultures, and sampling undiscovered flora and fauna might sound alluring, but José’s private notes reveal the harsh realities of turn-of-the-century collecting expeditions.

The work was hard and the days were long aboard the schooner France. Work typically commenced at dawn in the field and ended at dusk preparing specimens.⁴ Only exceptionally rugged individuals who were able to endure constant and extended deprivations — mind and body — could make such journeys.

As if these daily irritations weren’t enough, extreme weather in the form of cyclones, gale force winds, and rogue waves provided plenty of near-death experiences.

“…we ran into the center of a strong cyclone on June 2nd. Everybody in the ship thought that they were never going to see land again, but God did not forget us in the middle of the furious ocean.” June 19, 1926, J. Correia.⁴

Four years and 12,000 miles later, the Correia’s had the misfortune of contracting malaria, effectively ending their service aboard the France in 1926.⁶ But the Whitney South Sea Expedition wasn’t their first field collecting trip, nor would it be their last. They would go on to explore some of the most remote places on Earth.

It’s clear why the Correias continued to endure the hardships of collecting life. Not only did they believe birds held important keys to understanding the natural world, they had become a part of the scientific community who knew that time was running out. Their efforts were likely to be humanity’s only shot at cataloging, describing, and studying unknown bird species.

José’s fateful friend, Robert Cushman Murphy, Curator of the American Museum of Natural History’s Ornithology Department, describes the moral imperative driving the Whitney South Sea Expedition:

“That it is high time for such an expedition to obtain examples of the Polynesian life is evidenced by the decrease in the population of birds and other animals at nearly all of the inhabited isles. For many years extinction has been approaching, and it is well known that certain kinds of birds secured by 18th century naturalists, have long since been wiped out of existence.”⁸

In one of Murphy’s more personal memoirs, A Logbook for Grace, he tells of his first collecting expedition in 1911, working as a field collector on a brig named the Daisy. It’s here that we get a first glimpse of a young José who enlisted as the Antarctic voyage’s cooper — the liquid-tight barrels made under his charge were crucial to the operation, transporting whale spermaceti back to America.

Aboard the Daisy, the two men would become fast friends discussing everything from Arabian Nights to the Papacy. Murphy describes José as “profound” and a “voracious reader”⁹ and came to rely on the cooper’s help after realizing his natural drawing aptitude and skill for specimen preparation:

“One day when Dr. Murphy was preparing bird specimens Mr. Correia offered to help. His first attempt was so good that Dr. Murphy placed it in his collection and sought help again and again from the ship’s cooper.”¹⁰

In 1913, Correia was sought out by the American Museum of Natural History to work as a collector and preparateur on their next expedition after his friend, Mr. Murphy, showed officials at the American Museum Correia’s fine work.³

From Humble Beginnings

Before embarking on scientific expeditions, José worked as a whaling cooper (where he met Murphy) and a textile worker. In fact, between stints with the American Museum of Natural History, he would unassumingly return to work as an operative at Kerr Mills of the American Thread Company in Fall River, Massachusetts. When asked by fellow workers where he had gone, he would smile and simply reply “just away.”¹⁰

Correia’s humility came from memories of a very impoverished childhood. In his writings, he remarks that shoes were a luxury, reserved to be worn only “on feast days.” He was born in 1881, in Flamengos, a rural agrarian town on Faial, one of the nine islands in the Azorean archipelago. Like many Azorean youth, he had heard stories of America’s greatness from the Baleeiros (Azorean whalers), and he dreamed of the fabled land of opportunity.¹¹

At the age of 19, he left Faial and found warm welcome in New Bedford, Massachusetts, a burgeoning port city with a booming textile industry. The only thing José brought with him to America was a new suit, a sack of clothing, and his knowledge.¹¹ From his father, he had learnt the precise art of barrel-making and was taught the value of respect, dignity, and hard-work. These characteristics would serve him well throughout his life and helped him deal with both opportunity and tragedy. When he married Virginia in 1920, he was already a widower, having lost his first wife Rosa Silva in 1906 with whom he had one daughter, Mary.¹

Of Virginia Correia (née Aguiar), considerably less is known. Born in 1900 in Lajes, Terceira, Azores, she also immigrated to New Bedford at a young age.¹² Certainly she was a dedicated wife, joining her husband on difficult field expeditions and suffering all the aforementioned discomforts these journeys entailed.

Acting as her husband’s field assistant, she trained and became quite adept at the delicate art of preserving specimens. Character details can be gleaned from José’s journals, where he cites her as source of consistent strength and support. For example, during the Whitney South Sea Expedition, José and expedition lead, Rollo Beck, had seething enmity towards one another. José felt greatly disrespected by Beck and thought that the entire crew had turned against him under his influence. With a touch of sadness, he privately wrote, “The only person whom I can count on to help me is my wife. As for the others, I cannot rely on them.”

Nine years after his last expedition to South America²⁰, a 73-year old Correia attended a party in New Bedford’s South End that would be his last. He was stricken by a heart attack and died on 26 April 1954.¹¹ Virginia would live out the rest of her life in their shared New Bedford home at 23 Harrison Street, passing in 1987.¹²

One million North Americans make up the Azorean diaspora — four times the current population of the islands.¹³ José and Virginia are representative of a distinctly intrepid sea-faring culture. In spite of ever-present danger, their adventurous spirit would take them to the farthest reaches of the globe. In that vein, the Correias would go on to build a dichotomous double-life: immigrant factory workers with intermittent scientific travels around the world in search of undocumented bird life.

Despite strong ties to their homeland, they always came back to America — the place that had given them a life that “read like a fiction.”

Preserving the Correia Legacy

Over the course of their career, the Correias collected more than 10,000 bird specimens.¹⁴ Their efforts, alongside other historic field collectors, would help the American Museum of Natural History build one of the largest ornithology collections in the world.¹⁵ While the collection of wildlife specimens is controversial today, no longer done at this scale, these historic collecting efforts have provided the scientific foundation and necessary physical records for effective description and study of a species’ biology.¹⁶

The Whitney South Sea Expedition was the most extensive bird collecting expedition ever conceived at its time.⁷^,¹⁷ The expedition spanned two decades, covered roughly one-third of the planet, and brought back over 40,000 specimens to the American Museum of Natural History.¹⁸ The scientific bounty has greatly enriched our understanding of the natural biota from the Pacific region.

Notably, Ernst Mayr’s seminal argument for geography’s role in the origin of new species draws on the study of bird specimens gathered by the expedition.⁷ More than six decades later, Jared Diamond and Ernst Mayr’s book Birds of Melanesia would use the specimens gathered by the expedition to provide the most comprehensive study to-date on how speciation occurs (the process by which new and distinct species evolve).

Paul Sweet, American Museum of Natural History’s Ornithology Collection Manager, believes the number of specimens contributed by the couple could be far greater than is currently recorded due to poor labeling. Curation efforts are ongoing to improve data accuracy. One such effort is mentoring high school students to transcribe location data from crew field notes. Through these efforts, the France’s journey through the Pacific is being precisely charted, providing an interactive journey of species sightings. Explore the project here.

Museum specimen collections are, in essence, great libraries of Life — still rich in discoveries waiting to be made and perhaps even holding the keys to understanding our current public health crisis.

“Museum collections contribute unique and invaluable insights to the study of pathogens, vectors of disease, and environmental contaminants. Moreover, these collections have played a crucial role in fields at the forefront of the biological sciences, including the study of biodiversity and its loss, biological invasions, and global climate change. We argue that the storage and maintenance of museum collections is inexpensive compared with the potential costs of their absence.”¹⁹

To honor the great personal sacrifices made by historic field collectors like José and Virginia Correia, the call is being made to support the ongoing maintenance and digitization of museum collections. Their enduring utility should not be forgotten in these uncertain times. Museums across the country are facing difficult decisions and budget shortfalls due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the ongoing preservation and maintenance of these hard-won collections hangs in the balance.

•     •     •

If you would like to honor Virginia and José Correia’s life’s work, consider making a gift to BHL to ensure that the historic data contained in field notes and scientific publications are freely available to support ongoing research around the world. You can also support the ongoing maintenance of museum collections by donating to natural history institutions like the American Museum of Natural History.

Acknowledgements

This story was made possible by a CLIR Digitizing Hidden Special Collections and Archives Grant, which provided funding to the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and the Biodiversity Heritage Library to digitize the Whitney South Sea Expedition (1920–1941) field notes. A personal thanks to Grace Costantino, BHL’s Outreach and Communication Manager, and Erin Willigan for the opportunity to showcase this untold story. Thanks also to Paul Sweet, Thomas Trombone, and Mai Reitmeyer at AMNH for providing primary source materials, data, and most importantly, their time. To the librarians at the Peabody Essex Museum, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the New Bedford Free Public Library, who helped tracked down difficult to find newspaper articles and books, thank you.

References

[1] Shatzman, C. (2016, November 7). Correia, José G., 1881–1954. Retrieved October 10, 2020, from https://data.library.amnh.org/archives-authorities/id/amnhp_1000443.
[2] Correia, J. (1930–1941). Whitney South Sea Expedition of the American Museum of Natural History. The Biodiversity Heritage Library. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/121444.
[3] New Bedford Man, Off On 4-year Expedition for Museum, Has Life Reading Like Fiction. (1936, September 16). Standard-Times (New Bedford), p. 3.
[4] Correia, J. (1930–1941). Whitney South Sea Expedition of the American Museum of Natural History. v. 2. The Biodiversity Heritage Library. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/214343.
[5] Mayr, E. (n.d.). Joining the Whitney expedition. Web of Stories. Retrieved October 30, 2020, from https://www.webofstories.com/play/ernst.mayr/13.
[6] Murphy, R. (1936). Oceanic birds of South America : a study of species of the related coasts and seas, including the American quadrant of Antarctica, based upon the Brewster-Sanford collection in the American Museum of Natural History. The Biodiversity Heritage Library. p. 6. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/12471284.
[7] American Museum of Natural History. (2019). American Museum of Natural History | Research Library | Authorities | Expeditions [Dataset]. https://data.library.amnh.org/archives-authorities/results/?q=recordId:*amnhc_2*.
[8] Beck, R. H. (1930–1941). Whitney South Sea Expedition of the American Museum of Natural History. The Biodiversity Heritage Library. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/52734313.
[9] Murphy, R. C. (1965). Logbook for Grace. Time, Inc.
[10] Local Mill Operative Also Is Bird Expert for Scientific Expeditions. (1941 July 6). Standard-Times (New Bedford),p. 7.
[11] Agostinho, J. (1952). Um Emigrante Acoriano Jose Goncalves Correia. Boletim Do Instituto Historico, no.10, 204–238. http://ihit.pt/codeigniter/assets/upload/pdf/e3a418659d67d6609e2e58e7210779cb.pdf.
[12] Shatzman, C. (2016, November 7). Correia, José G., Mrs, 1900–1987. Retrieved October 10, 2020, from https://data.library.amnh.org/archives-authorities/id/amnhp_1002477.
[13] Minder, R. (2015, June 4). Azorean Diaspora Can’t Resist the Powerful Pull of Home. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/05/world/europe/azores-diaspora-holy-christ-of-miracles.html.
[14] Search: Collector “Correia”. (2006). Retrieved October 10, 2020, from https://sci-web-001.amnh.org/db/emuwebamnh.
[15] Research: Ornithology | AMNH. (2020). American Museum of Natural History. https://www.amnh.org/research/vertebrate-zoology/ornithology.
[16] Newton, B. E. (2017, January 9). Is specimen collecting justified? Lateral Magazine. http://www.lateralmag.com/articles/issue-18/is-specimen-collecting-justified.
[17] American Museum of Natural History. (1923). Annual report of the American Museum of Natural History for the year. Biodiversity Heritage Library. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/137096.
[18] Giraldo, S. (2016, October 20). Mapping the historical biodiversity of the Solomon Islands with the American Museum of Natural History. CARTO Blog. https://carto.com/blog/mapping-solomon-islands/.
[19] Suarez and Tstutsi. (2004). The Value of Museum Collections for Research and Society. BioScience, 54(1), 66. https://doi.org/10.1641/0006-3568(2004)054[0066:TVOMCF]2.0.CO;2.
[20] Newell, G. (2020, January 8). Askoy Expedition (1941-1945). Retrieved 24 November, 2020, from https://data.library.amnh.org/archives-authorities/id/amnhc_2000430.

Zoological knowledge typically comes from one of two primary sources: the living and the dead — observations of animals going about their business in their habitats; and the study of preserved specimens. We rarely get the whole picture of an animal’s natural history without both, and each feed into how species are portrayed to those that have never seen them.

Getting echidnas wrong

Consider the echidna, for example. Examining echidna specimens in museums helps us to understand their evolutionary relationships and enables us to come up with some reasonable suggestions for how they live their lives. The impenetrable coat of thick spines is clearly for defense against predators and guessing at an ant-eating lifestyle doesn’t require too much imagination when you think about what its narrow toothless snout and stout, digging claws might be for. However, we wouldn’t be able to confirm exactly how these things are put to use without seeing them alive.

As someone with one foot in the world of Australian mammal ecology (the living) and another in natural history museums (the dead), one thing that really interests me is the cross-over: how do the dead represent the living? Museums are sites of communication — they provide windows onto the natural world for people to engage with animals they may never see alive. This has made the topic of how animals are depicted — in writings, illustrations and museums — a real focus for me.

While museum specimens are in one sense a primary source, they are also modified by people in order to make them presentable to the public. Taxidermy is intended to make visitors forget the animal is dead, and to achieve that a flat animal skin has to be rebuilt into the shape of a living animal. The trouble is that throughout history, the person doing the taxidermy — particularly for specimens that had travelled to Europe from Australia — had often never seen the living animal. This means that their poses are often incorrect.

In the case of the echidna, it is extremely common for the back feet to point in the wrong direction — in life they should point backwards (enabling echidnas to scratch in between their spines and dig vertically downwards to bury themselves in defense), but taxidermists often didn’t know that, so twisted their feet around. I’ve come across tens of wrong-footed echidnas, and I know the reason why, but I was flummoxed a few years ago when I encountered an echidna with blue eyes at the Manchester Museum. Where did that error come from?

That mystery echidna popped back into my mind recently when re-reading the original species description on the Biodiversity Heritage Library, and I think I know the answer.

In 1792 George Shaw (who would also publish the first scientific description of the platypus seven year later) included “The Porcupine Ant-Eater” in The Naturalist’s Miscellany. Amongst an otherwise perfectly reasonable description of the species (which he considered to provide a link between actual porcupines in the genus Hystrix and actual ant-eaters in the genus Myrmecophaga), Shaw includes this line:

“The snout is long and tubular, and perfectly resembles in structure that of the Myrmecophaga jubata, or great ant-eater; having only a very small opening or rictus at the tip, from whence is protruded a long lumbriciform [worm-like] tongue, as in the ant-eaters. The nostrils are small, and seated near the extremity of the snout. The eyes are very small, and black, with a pale-blue iris.”

Curiously, the illustration that accompanies the text (above) — which is assumed to be based on a painting by Sydney-based collector John White — has correctly coloured black eyes. The question then becomes why Shaw thought echidnas had blue eyes — could it be that the eyes of Shaw’s specimen (sent by Joseph Banks) had been discoloured by the preservative? In any case, it seems likely that the echidna in Manchester was modified to fit Shaw’s original description.

Elsewhere on BHL, we can find examples of illustrations of echidnas that were clearly based on doctored dead specimens, rather than observations of living ones, as their feet incorrectly point forwards and the animals appear flattened. Artists were basing their depictions on “primary sources” in museum collections, but unfortunately those specimens weren’t accurate.

Tasting platypus milk

I am currently writing a new book on the echidnas’ relative, the platypus. I’ve been utterly reliant on the incredible collection of works on BHL to tell the story of the importance of platypus representations on the history of taxonomy. The introduction of the species to scientific circles in Europe sparked a decades-long debate over where it fitted on the tree of life and what characteristics mammals could possess. One of the many arguments in contention was whether or not they are mammals, another was whether or not they lays eggs. We now know they are, and they do.

A defining feature of mammals is that they feed their young with milk, so those who argued that platypuses are mammals were searching for evidence of milk-producing mammary glands even though platypuses lack nipples. Richard Owen was among those who was attempting to prove their milkiness.

The battle is played out in the documents available on BHL, and to my absolute delight, it led me to this line in one of Owen’s papers on platypus anatomy. Owen had squeezed what he thought was the mammary gland of a preserved platypus and watched the holes where the glands opened onto the skin:

“[T]here escaped from these orifices minute drops of a yellowish oil, which afforded neither perceptible taste nor smell, except such as was derived from the preserving liquor”.

Owen was so dedicated to his argument that he tasted the milk from a platypus that had been dead for many months, or even years.

Without a resource like BHL, putting together the pieces of the platypus puzzle across 220 years, and the changing way that specimens and field-observations have been used to inform representations of the animal over time, would be extremely difficult.

Twitter is a popular communication channel amongst the scientific community. Scientists use the platform to communicate with colleagues and share their research findings with both other scientists and the public.[1]

Twitter may also be a valuable source of data for researchers. For example, ecologists from the University of Gloucestershire found that “Twitter-mined” data is useful for phenological studies, such as winged-ant emergence or the appearance of house spiders in the fall.[2]

Twitter conversations can also spark unexpected discoveries. For example, a recent @BioDivLibrary Twitter conversation helped uncover a connection between the scientific literature and a museum’s collections.

It began with Boops boops, a fish — commonly called a bogue — native to the eastern Atlantic. @BioDivLibrary posted an illustration of the species in response to a tweet from Deborah Paul (@idbdeb), who shared the species as an example of a name uncovered while experimenting with parsing taxon names as part of the recent BHL data mining workshop at the University of Illinois.

?

Boops boops #SciArt from “A history of the fishes of the British Islands”, v. 1 (1868), in #BHLib via @SILibraries ➡️ https://t.co/A37BOVJ4Ru pic.twitter.com/HZVxA1ntoT

— BHL (@BioDivLibrary) June 18, 2019

The illustration, published in A History of the Fishes of the British Isles (1862-65), was based on a specimen collected in October 1842 and deposited in the Museum of the Royal Cornwall Institute at Truro. The text also mentions a second specimen, which was presented to the British Museum by a “W.P. Cocks, Esq.”. Paul tweeted an inquiry to see if anyone could help track down the current location of the specimen.

… and did you see this?! https://t.co/WzTtJjf6iN ~ specimen collected October 1842 ~ deposited Museum of the Royal Cornwall Institute at Truro ~ Wonder where it is now? Any help @NHM_Digitise? Who has Boops boops specimen from 1842? @ASIHCopeia @SPNHC @GBIF @DiSSCoEU @iDigBio? pic.twitter.com/TuJ09ueKGK

— Deborah Paul (@idbdeb) June 19, 2019

@NHM_Digitise called on James Maclaine (@beardiddley), senior curator of fishes at the Natural History Museum in London, for help tracking down the specimens. Pulling from a reference in Albert Gunther’s Catalogue of the Fishes in the British Museum, Maclaine responded that the Museum likely held the “W.P. Cocks, Esq.” specimen (with the label reading “Cork” instead of “Cocks”) and proceeded to tweet a picture of the specimen itself.

We do have one of the other ones in the reference I think (assuming W.P.Cocks and W.P.Cork are the same person!). From Albert Gunther’s Catalogue of Fishes, 1859, vol.1, p.419. pic.twitter.com/uZ5gibJmOm

— James Maclaine (@beardiddley) June 20, 2019

Here’s what the Cocks/Cork specimen looks like! The missing one will probably be dried too. pic.twitter.com/sFdaUMn5jW

— James Maclaine (@beardiddley) June 20, 2019

Beyond providing an example of the kinds of discoveries possible on the Twitterverse, this conversation also highlights the value of scientific literature for providing information on museum collections.

“Sadly, despite their many other qualities, the Victorians weren’t great at recording some details which we now would consider essential, so it is often difficult to determine the history of a 19th century fish specimen,” shares Maclaine.

When information is missing on specimen labels, the literature may be able to help fill in the gaps. For Maclaine and others managing collections, having access to this literature through BHL is incredibly valuable.

Can I just say as well, I LOVE BHL, I use it nearly every day!

— James Maclaine (@beardiddley) June 20, 2019

Maclaine finds BHL’s collections particularly useful when researching type specimens, the specific specimen used to describe a new species and the “typical” example of that species.

“Types are the most important part of our collection and are essential to any research on the species that they represent,” explains Maclaine. “However, many currently lurk unrecognized on our shelves, and it’s part of my job to find them, correctly identify them as types, and then update our records accordingly. This is where BHL comes in.”

Maclaine uses BHL sometimes several times each day, using the taxonomic name finding feature to locate literature on specific species, downloading relevant documents as PDFs, and linking to useful references using page permalinks.

“BHL has been fundamentally useful in two ways,” asserts Maclaine. “Firstly, it’s very easy to quickly get old references. Secondly, being able to download them is very helpful too. When investigating potential type specimens, I often have to go back to those first original species descriptions in the 19th century journals, which is now so quick and easy to do online. If I’m lucky, the species author will give a collecting locality, a collector and a measurement. If all three of those and the species name tie up with the specimen, I can be fairly certain that it was used when the species was described and is a type.”

Maclaine first discovered BHL via Eschmeyer’s Catalog of Fishes, a fish taxonomy database of all known fish names, the history of those names and where they were first published.

“One day I noticed a blue hyperlink next to a reference with the message ‘See ref. at BHL’, and that was that,” recalls Maclaine.

As the manager of the fish collection at the Natural History Museum, Catalogue of the Fishes in the British Museum (1859-1868) is one of the most useful books in BHL’s collection for Maclaine’s work. In fact, it was this title that led him to the “W.P. Cocks, Esq.” specimen that he shared on Twitter.

Managing a 250+ year old collection means that Maclaine is responsible for ensuring that the information available for the specimens in his care is correct and up-to-date. BHL not only helps him provide reliable data for current researchers, but is also a valuable contributor to the legacy he will leave for future researchers.

“I have to think of all the generations of curators and researchers who will come after me and think, will what I’m doing be clear and comprehensible hundreds of years after I’m dead?” says Maclaine. “So, it’s great that I can now download the relevant references and then attach them to the specimen record so that everyone can see what I’ve done and why. I think the only bad thing about BHL is that it means I now spend less time in our Museum Library, another fantastic and irreplaceable resource!”

By making their literature digitally available, our Partners have ensured that anyone, anywhere can access important collections data. We’re proud to be a part of empowering new discoveries and connections, whether that be through a Twitter conversation or the diligent work of a museum collections manager.

References

[1] Phys.org. 2016. “New Study Reveals How Scientists Use Social Media.” Social Sciences, October 12. Accessed on July 9, 2019. https://phys.org/news/2016-10-reveals-scientists-social-media.html.

[2] Adam G. Hart, William S. Carpenter, Estelle Hlustik-Smith, Matt Reed, Anne E. Goodenough. “Testing the potential of Twitter mining methods for data acquisition: Evaluating novel opportunities for ecological research in multiple taxa.” Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 2018; DOI: 10.1111/2041-210X.13063.

On September 12, 1967 Ralph Axtell, of the Biology Department of Southern Illinois University, called the Smithsonian Institution using the teletype connected to his time-shared computer and asked for a [computer] program for the calculation of standard deviations. The Smithsonian then sent him two computer programs. This demonstrated that, using data communications equipment and telephone lines, “it is fast, practical, and feasible to exchange programs in the BASIC language, written for use by biosystematists, between institutions in the United States.” A revolution had begun that would transform museums, research, systematics and science.

The following day, Dr. James A. Peters produced the inaugural issue of the MUDPIE (Museum and University Data Program and Information Exchange) Newsletter.

MUDPIE newsletter documents many early events in the adoption of computers and timesharing computing in museums and universities, and was founded and produced by Dr. Peters, the only editor in the newsletter’s publication history. Twenty-six issues of MUDPIE were produced and distributed over a five-year period, between September 1967 and September 1972. All issues are now digitally available at the Biodiversity Heritage Library thanks to the Smithsonian Libraries.

The length and contents of each MUDPIE issue varied depending on the amount of information available; it was published irregularly from two and eight issues per year; one to seven pages per issue. Peters’ name appeared infrequently; however some MUDPIE articles were signed with his initials “(JAP)”. The publication of the MUDPIE newsletter ceased with his untimely death.

Dr. James Arthur Peters (June 13, 1922 – December 18, 1972), biologist and herpetologist, held two positions in the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH), Division of Reptiles and Amphibians at the Smithsonian Institution, first as Associate Curator (1964–1967), and later Curator (1967–1972).

Dr. Peters clearly stated his aspirations in the first issue: “MUDPIE represents an attempt to keep everyone up to date on the development of time-shared computing in museums and universities engaged in systematic research. Several individuals receiving this first copy had written asking the same questions, and this is a quick way of answering them. There was a tremendous temptation to set it up so that it could be received only through the teletype and computer — but that proved to be a little too advanced for the present!”

This newsletter was a pioneering example of “electronic networking” between people. It foreshadowed the development of Usenet newsgroups, mailing lists, Listserv software, BITNET, and Internet Forums.

Two years later Dr. Peters wrote (p. 4) under the heading Participation in the Making of Mudpies: “There seems to be a genuine interest in the continued existence of this Newsletter, to judge from the number of people in the natural history museum business who have requested to be placed on the mailing list. We will continue to put it together and get it out at irregular intervals, but we have no objection at all to any of you who have something that you think might be of interest to others and send it in for inclusion to MUDPIE. We have had no indication of specialized programs written for use by systematists, for example, in the last few issues, but it is quite likely that such work is being done.”

Caroline A. Bull interviewed Dr. Peters on April 25, 1969, and provided an independent assessment (p. 47): “Museum and University Data, Program and Information Exchange, known by its acronym MUDPIE. There are six institutions which participate actively in the exchange.  Each has computer access and cooperation ranges from the exchange of [paper] tapes to actual direct access to storage units. The direct access capability occurs only between the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History and the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Since these two [organizations] share the same central computer at C.E.I.R.[1] in Silver Spring, Maryland, each may tap into the others’ data bank and exchange messages and data directly. These two form the nucleus for a major network, which could involve other Institutions on the Northern Atlantic Seaboard. In addition to its computerized information exchange, MUDPIE circulates a monthly newsletter to some 100 individuals and institutions.”

The period 1967-1972 was well before the development of personal computers and major advances in data communications. The Teletype Model 33 ASR (Automatic Send and Receive) was the likely computer terminal of choice for time-sharing computing activities by MUDPIE members during this time-period. The Teletype was an electromechanical device which stored data and computer programs on punched paper tape in ASCII code. A Teletype Model 33 terminal that was used at the Smithsonian was connected to a telephone line using an acoustic modem, see illustration in Peters and Collette [2].

After Peters’ death George R. Zug [3]wrote: “James A. Peters died on 18 December 1972 of liver cancer. With his death, we have lost the most ardent supporter of a low cost museum and university time-sharing computer network. He had seen the concept of computer networks gain wider acceptance and had just participated in the first general working seminar on a National Science Computer Network in mid-November.

Jim established MUDPIE in 1967 in order to promote the use of time-sharing and the establishment of a computer network among the major American natural history museums. The scope of MUDPIE gradually broadened to encompass the use of time-sharing in all types of museums and for the analysis of all types of data, including systematic data.”

No copy of the MUDPIE mailing list is known to have survived. However, among Dr. Peters’ papers in the SI Archives[4] is a folder labeled “MUDPIE Letters”. This includes more than 120 items of correspondence largely related to MUDPIE memberships, but also includes some requests for reprints of publications listed in MUDPIE issues. In this folder there is a handwritten list of 24 names, labeled “MUDPIE #1”, which appears to be the initial newsletter distribution list. In April 1969, Bull and Shank, (p.47) reported that the membership was “100 individuals and institutions”. Requests to be added to the mailing list could have been received verbally in person, by telephone, etc. The “MUDPIE Letters” folder is certainly not a comprehensive list of names and organizations.

As word of MUDPIE newsletter spread and interest in computers grew, membership increased also. Bruce Collette[5], (p. 390) observed that, “The mailing list for MUDPIE was over 250, an indication of how much effect the interest and dedication of one man can accomplish.”

Outcome

This free interchange of data and computer programs probably seemed like a utopian dream for these early visionary of 1960’s, but has become the norm today with the adoption of open computer systems, open data standards, standardized software, high speed data communication networks, and of course, the Internet. The MUDPIE newsletter represents an important historical record of the early exploration of and developments in computer technology and its application in museums and systematic biology.

A special thank you is extended to the Smithsonian Libraries staff, particularly Martha Rosen of the National Museum of Natural History Library and its Smithsoniana Collection, who was a persistent advocate for preserving and improving access to the newsletter. And to the Preservation Services staff – Katie Wagner, Don Stankavage, and Michael Keeling – for their review, repair, and rehousing of the original MUDPIE newsletters.

Thanks also to Discovery Services staff – Erik Bergstrom and Dana Feil – for their review and re-cataloging, and for providing item-level description for the newsletters. And a final thank you to the Digital Programs and Initiatives staff – Jacqueline E. Chapman and Daniel Euphrat – for coordinating this process, digitizing the newsletters, and including them in the BHL corpus.

[1]  CEIR or the Center for Enterprise Information Research was a commercial company which operated several computer data centers and provided, among other things, dial-up computer time-sharing service.

[2]  Peters, James A. and Bruce B. Collette. 1968. The role of Time-share computing in museum research. Curator 11(1):65-75.

[3]  George R. Zug, a colleague of Peters and Curator at the National Museum of Natural History.

[4]  Smithsonian Institution Archives, Record Unit 7175, Peters, James Arthur, 1922-, James A. Peters Papers, and Records of the Division of Reptiles and Amphibians, box 37, folder 8.

[5]  Collette, B. B., “James A. Peters”, Copeia, 1973 (2):388-390.