October 20th – An Evening with William Brewster: Readings from the Journals of an Ornithologist

Bird watcher (and sound artist) Dianne Ballon has been wanting to present An Evening with William Brewster ever since she found a copy of Concord River: Selections from the Journals of William

Brewster, Harvard University Press, 1937. His observations and explorations are quietly extraordinary.

William Brewster (1851-1919) was a renowned naturalist, conservationist and ornithologist. He worked as a curator at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology, and gifted a lifetime of bird observations to Harvard. He co-founded the American Ornithologists Union and the Nuttall Ornithological Club, served as the first president of Mass Audubon.https://www.yorkcountyaudubon.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/08/BW_brewster_1883-197×300.jpg

Brewster’s collection of diaries, journals, correspondence and photographs are a trove of valuable scientific data and a delightful account of his years exploring the woods, fields, rivers, and lakes of New England.

Join us for an evening of readings from the bird observations of William Brewster. We will hear from two Harvard archivists from the Ernst Mayr Library, Museum of Comparative Zoology, who continue to work on the Brewster collection. We will hear from the Executive Director of the Museums of the Bethel Historical Society on Brewster’s connection to Maine. And then, we’ll settle in for an evening of late nineteenth-century bird observations up and down the Concord River.

This program will be presented in-person in the Mather Auditorium of the Wells Reserve at Laudholm. The entrance to the parking area is off Skinner Mill Road in Wells. It will be free and open to all ages, and no registration is required for attending the program in person. It will also be live-streamed via Zoom.

To view via Zoom, you’ll need to register in advance.  To do so, please click on this link and enter your name and email address:  https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_BzbK_hTARDaHEQy9Zybjtw

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

We hope you can join us in-person, or, if not, via Zoom!