John Young is perhaps not as well-known as some of the other BOC founding fathers and very little information on his life seems to have been published. Nevertheless, during his lifetime he undertook several ornithological expeditions that were both impressive in their extensive geographical scope and in the important discoveries made. John Young was born in 1838, the fourth of five children born to Rev. Edward Newton Young and Ann Young of Quainton, Buckinghamshire. He […]
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Founders of the British Ornithologists’ Club: 14. Thomas James Monk (1831*–1899)
While Thomas James Monk was among those attending the founding meeting of the British Ornithologists’ Club in 1892, very little appears to have been written about his life and ornithological activities. He was born in 1831* in Lewes, Sussex, to the corn merchant and brewer Edward Monk (1799–1888), being the second of four children – Emily, Thomas, Midhurst and Edward Jr. In the late 1850s, Edward Monk Sr had acquired the Bear Brewery, sited at […]
Read moreFounders of the British Ornithologists’ Club: 13. Henry Thornton Wharton (1846-1895)
A physician and ornithologist with a passion for language, nomenclature and orthography, Henry Thornton Wharton was a stickler for detail and the classification of birds. Wharton was born in Mitcham, Surrey, in 1846. His father was a vicar, and his mother was a member of the historically prestigious House of Courtenay. Wharton was the fourth of seven children; his elder brother, Edward Ross, was a notable classical scholar and genealogist, and a Fellow of Jesus […]
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Founders of the British Ornithologists’ Club: 12. Francis George Penrose (1857–1932)
Francis George Penrose, a physician by profession with an overriding passion for natural history and photography, was an early adopter of ornithological photography and the formal study of bird migration. Francis George Penrose was born into the respected Penrose family in St. Pancras, Middlesex in 1857. His father, Francis Cranmer Penrose, was a renowned architect, archaeologist and astronomer who was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society in 1894 and was Surveyor of the […]
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Founders of the British Ornithologists’ Club: 11. Count Tommaso Salvadori (1835–1923)
One of the BOC founders at the Mona Hotel on 5 October 1892 was Count Tommaso Salvadori, distinguished ornithologist and close associate of Richard Bowdler Sharpe (see Founders’ Blog no.1). Salvadori, vice-director of the Museum of Zoology at Turin University, had a long association with the BOU, becoming a Foreign Member in 1872 and an Honorary Member in 1890, and with the British Museum (Natural History), which he first visited in 1877. In 1890 he […]
Read moreFounders of the British Ornithologists’ Club: 10. William Graham (1850-1897)
Of all 15 founders of the BOC, William Graham has proved the most elusive to track down information on or any picture. Indeed, almost the only published source that has thus far come to light is his brief, half-page, obituary in Ibis. As this notes, part of the reason for his elusiveness may be that “Graham disliked writing.” Seemingly, he also disliked public speaking, at least on ornithology (see below), as there are no records […]
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