Bird Clubs in America 59
patrons of Audubon as Spencer and Harris. Reed (architect) had been both associate and rival of Rhoads in birds-nesting escapades at boarding school in his early teens. 'Rhoads (farmer) was, at eight years' stepson and scholar of Morris’s aunt, to whose love of nature both owe more than to any other cause the bent of mind which was later shaped by intimate association with each other and with Prof. E. D. Cope, who then lived in Haddonfield, N. J. Trotter (student) was cousin and associate of N. T. Lawrence, an ornithological nephew of George N. Lawrence, and had just left a scholarship at the Academy of Natural Sciences to study medicine. Stone (the naturalist) had recently taken a scholarship at the Academy and was then unknown to any of us save Trotter. His noble rage for bird lore in particular and for animal and vegetable lore in general seems to have been due to spontaneous generation. Voelker had emigrated to the States some years previously from Germany and was a taxidermist of talent, his father being forester on a large German estate.
All of us were young men, Morris being the youngest at 23, and Trotter oldest at 30, when the club was organized,
Several of the members had previously made local observation records for the A. O. U. committee on bird migration, and a more thorough survey of the vicinity of Philadelphia along this line engrossed the Club during the first year. An elaborate summary of this work was prepared by a commit- tee, and Mr. Stone, as editor-in-chief, was delegated to present it to the Al O. U. Congress, soon to be held at Washington, where it was well received and published in ‘The Auk.’ Previous papers and communica- tions by the members had been published in ‘The Auk,’ ‘American Natur- alist,‘ etc., as well as reports of Club meetings in the local newspapers; in this way not only encouraging the members to do original and careful work, but attracting others to join the Club, or furnish data and specimens which would otherwise have been lost. Applications for membership increasing, an ‘associate‘ class was provided for, unlimited in number, the ‘active' membership being restricted to ten persons, who had the sole privilege of voting and holding office. This number has since been raised to fifteen, becauSe of so many associates developing rapidly into first-rate workers. Contrary to the custom of more conservative clubs, our active class is always kept filled by such, it being understood that resignation is in order when any active member lapses into an ornithologically passive state. To insure this elimination of deadwood, the constitution has been so framed as to make it automatic. Associates are restricted to residents in the states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and NIaryland, and to any person (age limit not defined) who is proposed by an active member, as one with a taste for bird study. Our object in these selections was primarily to add as much young blood to the organization as possible, and to encourage these fellows
