Winging It: Time to Flock to the Newberry

With surely Chicago’s most creative exhibition title, Winging It which opened last weekend at the Newberry Library shows the breadth of the Library’s collection and can thus reflect on the relationship of birds and humans across 600 years. Not to be missed are first editions that profoundly influenced future naturalists, rare song sheets, an 1877 precursor to today’s Field and Stream, a cookbook from the 1970s featuring baked woodcock, beautiful paintings of birds found in the wild in South Carolina in the 1700s, and even a prairie chicken on loan from the Peggy Notebaert Museum,  We asked the exhibition’s curator Bob Dolgan how one begins to ferret out so many intriguing materials related to birds and man from the Newberry’s encyclopedic collection.

“We have so many experts on staff at the Newberry so I started planning the exhibition by asking them for suggestions. That’s where I learned of the many original works we have of Mark Catesby, who painted birds alive in their natural habitats, and Thomas Bewick, who created bird woodblocks, the same patterns you can see on mugs and dinner plates today. Another great example, that I wouldn’t have thought of on my own, is the Driscoll Sheet Music collection. We have hundreds of boxes of sheet music from the early twentieth century and incredibly there is one completely devoted to bird songbooks.”

Ringing the exhibition are blow ups of paintings, including a marvelous flamingo, done by Mark Catesby, the first British citizen to visit our country.  “He was really roughing it there in the 1700s but really wanted to see the flora and fauna around South Carolina. He turned to the Royal Society and subscribers to publish his work.  Unlike Audubon, he painted live birds from memory,” Dolgan said.

We toured the exhibition on opening day with Dolgan who is also the creator of the documentary “The World of Monty and Rose”, Montrose Beach’s famous piping plovers who raised Chicago’s spirits during the pandemic and whose son Imani and his Sea Rocket are raising tiny chicks on same beach today.  On August 21, as part of Winging It, this tribute to these tiny but mighty members of an endangered species will be shown.

Looking at the first items in the exhibition, including Charles Hallock’s Sportsman’s Gazetteer and General Guide from 1877, a comprehensive guide to the best hunting and fishing spots, Dolgan pointed out that “later in the 1700s and early 1800s wealthy people would look at books as a source for very detailed information such as where to hunt ducks.  Dog training for hunting purposes also became important around this time.”

From the Newberry’s copious collection of postcards, a woman wearing an egret plume recalls the sad time when so many of these birds were killed for adornment on ladies’ hats and required for presentation at royal balls abroad.

Dolgan told us that In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the great egret was nearly hunted to extinction in Illinois. This led to the passage of the Lacey Act in 1900, the first federal law protecting wildlife, and later the Migratory Bird Treaty Act in 1918, which significantly helped the bird’s recover.

 A hand-colored book from 1598 written in old German about natural healing and featuring mammals, insects and birds showcases the rare materials Dolgan found in the Library’s vast collections. Nocturne, Chicago 2024 by Chicago artist Tony Fitzpatrick who has exhibited at the Art Institute Chicago of the Museum of Modern Art in New York features a collage of Chicago subjects around a local blue grosbeak.

We asked Dolgan, who was a history major, to tell us more about the implications of the exhibition’s full title”. Winging It:  A Brief History of Humanity’s Relationship with Birds”.

CCM:  How did your focus on birds begin?

BD: “I became interested in birds during elementary school when I saw John James Audubon’s Birds of America in a library. Then I started going to bird walks at a local park and arboretum with my mother. I have been birding ever since.

“Now I like to go birding in the Cook County forest preserves and along Lake Michigan. We have so many wonderful options in the Chicago area.”

CCM: Although the northern cardinal is Illinois’ state bird, the prairie chicken is one of its most famous. tell us more.

BD: “This is a species that was very prevalent throughout Illinois and the Midwest in the nineteenth century and showed up in several works as I did research. Early visitors and settlers remarked upon the constant “booming” sounds, the chicken’s vocalizations, that were heard all throughout the state. However, the coming of the railroads and the parceling up of land into farms took away much of the birds’ habitat. So much so that we have fewer than 200 left in the state now. We also have a video in the exhibition about the prairie chicken: “The Best Known Grouse of the Western States.”

CCM:  Visitors can take a bird checklist of almost 40 different birds found in Washington Square Park across from the Newberry..  What is fun and challenging about keeping a bird list, and do you have one?  What are some of those on your list?

BD: Keeping a list is fun to me because it’s a historical record but also a bit of a fun game. It’s not competitive for me, but it does result in learning about some new places to go birding. I keep multiple lists and one is my yard list. That one is great because it has some unusual species–Northern Shrike, Philadelphia Vireo, Orchard Oriole, and Yellow-billed Cuckoo–for a Chicago backyard.  The Washington Square Park list may introduce someone to all the possible birds in even a small urban park.

CCM:  What are the key lessons that birds teach us?  We think about Monty and Rose. Not only their incredible ability to return to their special place for three years, but what other things do they tell us?

BD: There are some straightforward lessons about being good stewards of the planet and of our local environment. But also their devotion as parents. In experiencing Monty and Rose from 2018 through 2021, we saw both plovers defend their territory so fiercely, chasing off much larger birds so they could protect their chicks. We also saw the tender moments of brooding the young birds and keeping them warm.  One of the most distressing moments was in 2018 when the plovers’ nested in Waukegan in a parking lot and their eggs had to be moved. It was difficult for all involved, but it was for the best that the eggs be taken to an incubator, there was just too much risk.

CCM: Speaking of the plovers, tell us about the documentaries you have done.

BD: I have made two documentaries about Monty and Rose. The first came in 2019 shortly after the birds arrived. I was a volunteer plover monitor and was present throughout that first summer, which came as such a surprise as piping plovers hadn’t nested in Chicago in more than a half-century. Then there was losing a first nest to lakeshore flooding and the announcement of a music festival on the beach. All of that happened, and the birds still had two chicks make it to fledging. The first film was a 23-minute short, and then I did it again in 2021 as the plovers had been in Chicago for three years. That one was 50 minutes in length.

CCM: What would you tell us about the significance of Monty and Rose, their little grandchildren chicks and the whole piping plover phenomenon that means so much to Chicago.  They teach us so much about conservation.  How did you get involved in this important emphasis on helping the plovers?

BD: Yes, Monty, Rose, Imani, and Sea Rocket have meant a lot, for raising awareness of piping plovers in Chicago and throughout the Great Lakes. This is a highly endangered species–only 80 or so pairs remaining–and we are fortunate to have one pair in Chicago. Just to have people talking about piping plovers is a success for a species that has declined due to development of beaches. At Montrose Beach, you get an up-close look at the plovers and so many other species that you may not see anywhere else.

I was one of the first volunteer monitors at the beach in early June 2019. I was birding a lot that year and had been watching all the plovers and sandpipers on the beach. Then suddenly two of the piping plovers began showing mating behavior. The story unfolded from there.”

For those who love birds and want to preserve them and their Illinois habitat as well as historians who delight in the Newberry Library’s astonishing connections, Winging It should not be missed.

For further information about Winging it,  visit:  newberry.org