In early July my fiancé and I, along with his brother and wife, spent two nights and three days camping at Schoolcraft State Park in northern Minnesota. The park is named after Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, the geologist that discovered the…
The New Year was especially exciting at the University Archives, as during the second week of 2014 the Exploring Minnesota’s Natural History project surpassed 100,000 individual scans. To date, over 110,000 archival materials – photographs, negatives, pages from field notebooks,…
A few months ago, I checked out Walter J. Breckenridge’s autobiography My Life in Natural History, which was published by the Bell Museum in 2009. In the book, the taxidermist and curator (from 1926-1946) and eventual director (from 1946-1970) of…
Minnesota winter scenes from Koma Lake in the Superior National Forest, 1938: – Snow on Koma Lake, Cook County, March 1938 – Beaver cutting on Koma Lake, Cook County, March 1938…
The old adage, “A picture is worth a thousand words” can certainly be applied to the images in the Bell Museum of Natural History collection. And, as it has been my experience, a single picture can also send you in…
What they did before Google… Question C.D. Velie to Thomas Sadler Roberts, December 8, 1921: My Dear Doctor: I have two carrier pigeons, mounted, on my desk here at the office, which you can have if you will send over…
In honor of Veterans Day, it is apt to share a patriotic image: – Itasca State Park Commissioner John P. Gibbs at the Park House, 1902 A small slip of paper inserted within the envelope that protects this glass plate…
As I was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, holding a wet washcloth to my forehead in an attempt to reduce my fever, I remembered a series of letters I read last week from the correspondence files of the…
A reminder to appreciate the fall season in Minnesota – no more mosquitoes! – William Kilgore Jr. and Thomas Sadler Roberts wearing “head-nets” at Itasca State Park, 1920…
Hardly a day goes by where I don’t take a lunch break to enjoy a sandwich complete with an essential ingredient: mushrooms. But on Wednesday, just two days ago, my hand-packed sandwich was sans mushrooms on a rare occurrence (for…