Library event features feathered friend

Students from Donata Henry’s, senior professor of practice in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, History of Louisiana class and others were on hand to witness last week’s “Flipping the Bird” event at Tulane University Special Collections in the Howard-Tilton Memorial Library. The event features the turning of a page in one of John James Audubon’s Birds of America series. Jennifer Coulson of the Orleans Audubon Society brought along a great horned owl named Hamy to the event.

Birds of America was competed between 1827-1838. Around 87,000 prints were completed for the 435 plates found in the edition. 200 copies of the four-volume set were published and today, only about 120 complete sets remain, some in private collections and libraries. Tulane has three volumes. A page of the one of the volumes is turned each week to protect Audubon’s illustrations from prolonged light exposure.

Photos by Rusty Costanza