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Mission
The purpose of this e-book is to
introduce Arthur Cleveland Bent's (1866-1954) work to new
generations of bird watchers, conservationists, and amateur
naturalists. Extracted from the voluminous National Museum
Bulletin series and assembled in one easily accessible place,
here is a broad sampling of the Life
Histories of North American Birds (twenty-one volumes
in all, published between 1919 and 1968).
Included are the Life Histories of some of
the most widely distributed, abundant, popular, and familiar birds
of the more than 800 species which currently breed, regularly
visit, or are occasionally seen somewhere in North America.
The primary consideration in
deciding which of the histories to present in this collection was
how widespread and/or abundant the birds currently are in North
America. Of additional concern was a desire to provide coverage of
a broad array of families and popular species. And, finally, it
was necessary to exercise personal judgment in evaluating the
contextual appropriateness of the histories of likely candidates,
individually and collectively. Some familiar birds not included
might well have been chosen by another editor.
The times in which Bent lived are
clearly reflected in his writing, and there have certainly been
many new discoveries and additions to ornithological knowledge in
the intervening years. In the Life Histories selected for
publication here there are occasional references to hunting
practices and egg, feather, and nest collecting that are now
illegal or require special permits according to several federal
bird protection acts. There are also some subspecies mentioned
that are no longer recognized by the American Ornithologists'
Union; some of the nomenclature has changed since these reports
were first published. Nevertheless, the eminently valuable
original historical text is preserved in this collection with very
little alteration. Only negligible editing was necessary to
present the material in this context. In the original National
Museum Bulletins, asterisks indicate Bent's deletions in
material submitted by contributors. I have replaced these
asterisks with the more usual ellipsis points, but borrowed Bent's
use of asterisks to indicate the relatively few places where I in
turn made cuts (of obviously outdated and potentially confusing
material) in the text. In addition, the titles of the accounts
have been updated to include the current common and scientific
names of the species, and the outdated "Distribution"
sections of the original histories have been omitted.
The selected accounts, written by
Bent and his collaborators with the assistance of numerous
contributors, have been electronically reset. The black-and-white
photos which originally appeared in the National
Museum Bulletins are not included in this electronic work.
The presentation of species in the Table of
Contents is in taxonomic order according to the A.O.U.
Check-list (7th Edition, 1998). They are listed alphabetically
by current common name in the Index and
cross-referenced under today's scientific name as well as the
common name used by Bent if it differs. For example, the entries
for Falco sparverius and Eastern
Sparrow Hawk refer the reader to the bird's current common
name, American Kestrel.
Arthur Cleveland Bent traditionally
concluded his introductory notes to each volume with this
statement: "The reader is reminded again that this is a
cooperative work; if he fails to find in these volumes anything
that he knows about the birds, he can blame himself for not having
sent the information to--THE AUTHOR." Conversely, if the
reader fails to find here Bent's life histories of all the
popular, well-known, or wide-ranging North American birds that
might have been included, file storage considerations and my
individual judgment and biases are to blame for their absence. It
is my sincere hope, however, that this e-book will indeed serve to
introduce the pioneering ornithological work of Arthur Cleveland
Bent to a significant new group of readers. For those interested
in the detailed coverage of additional species, the numbers,
titles, and publication dates of the complete twenty-one-volume
series of Life Histories of North American Birds,
originally issued as United States National Museum Bulletins,
are listed in the Appendix. Paperback
reprint editions of some of these volumes are still available in
conventional book form. (To check availability click on the
Amazon.com icon below and search for the keywords Arthur
Cleveland Bent in the Books category.)
Patricia
Query Newforth (Editor, Compiler, and Copyright Owner of this
electronic book)
Read
about Arthur Cleveland Bent
and his work
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