Roger Tory Peterson was an American naturalist and ornithologist, and a leader of the environmental movement in the 20th century, for which he won a Presidential Medal of Freedom Award in 1980 and was nominated for two Nobel Peace Prizes. Peterson was born in Jamestown, New York on August 28, 1908. He began recording his field experiences early on, and in 1934 he published his seminal Guide to Birds, the first modern field guide that would become highly influential to bird and nature studies. It was the first field guide for “regular people” and was reprinted in several editions within the next few years. Peterson was known for the highly detailed drawings within his field guides; he drew every creature catalogued in his guides, and created paintings and prints of birds in addition to the field guides. Later in his career, he enjoyed travel, and wrote field guides about other animals and the places to which he traveled. Peterson began to fight against DDT use in the 1960s, after research completed by Rachel Carson and others fully convinced him of the chemical’s negative effects; he became a prominent figure in the fight for conservation, and continued monitoring bird populations affected by chemicals after DDT was banned in 1972. Just as Peterson influenced how wildlife and wildlife art were seen and used around the world, he also influenced and promoted the field of wildlife photography as a way to report on and observe the world. In addition to his own photographic work, as seen in this collection, he also was influential in founding the North American Nature Photography Association, the association of wildlife photographers, in 1993. Roger Tory Peterson died on July 28, 1996 in Old Lyme, Connecticut.
