03/14/2024
๐ฆ๐ถ๐ป๐ด๐ฒ๐ฟ ๐ง๐ฟ๐ฎ๐ฐ๐ history lives on in Northeast Louisiana!
In 1944, wildlife agent ๐๐ฒ๐๐๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ถ๐ฟ๐ฑ guided artist Don Eckleberry to sketch the famous "lone female" Ivory-billed Woodpecker.
This week, I had the honor and delight of walking through the same Singer Tract woods (now Tensas River National Wildlife Refuge) with some of ๐๐ฒ๐๐๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ถ๐ฟ๐ฑ'๐ ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐๐ฐ๐ฒ๐ป๐ฑ๐ฎ๐ป๐๐: his grandson, Vic Laird, and wife, Paula; and their son, Jesse, and wife, Shannon, and their children, Brooklyn, Wesley, and Wade.
I was tickled to find that the "nature gene" has continued down through the Laird line. All of them were keenly aware ofโand interested inโthe woodland sights. Admittedly, the youngest, Wade Laird, slept through some of the time as we ventured through the same magnificent woods that his great great grandfather had protected 80 years before.
To show the continuity, compare James Tanner's 1939 photo of the same Lake Rainey Bald Cypress that is in the background from Monday's photo of the mighty Lairds on the Lake Rainey dock.
Based mostly on his 1930s study of Ivorybills in the Singer Tract, James Tanner wrote THE Ivorybill book, ๐๐๐ ๐๐ซ๐ค๐ง๐ฎ-๐๐๐ก๐ก๐๐ ๐๐ค๐ค๐๐ฅ๐๐๐ ๐๐ง, which was published in 1942. The 1939 photo is courtesy of the LSU Library Special Collections.
Hat tip for that goes to my incomparable-wildlife-describing friend of 50 years, ๐๐ฒ๐น๐ฏ๐ ๐ข๐๐ฐ๐ต๐น๐ฒ๐. In the 1980s, Dr. Tanner gave to Kelby (then the manager of Tensas River NWR) the negatives of the 1930s photos. In turn, Kelby generously donated them to LSU.
As a result, the public can freely access these priceless photos through the Louisiana Digital Library:
https://louisianadigitallibrary.org/islandora/object/lsu-sc-tensas%3Acollection
