EXHIBIT HOME

Rollo Beck (left) preparing specimens in the hold of the Mary Sachs.
From the Deane Collection, Library of Congress (LC-USZ62-115840).

When the Rollo Beck exhibit opened on Friday, April 21, 2006,
there was a series of events throughout the weekend. The press release is here.

Rollo Howard Beck (1870-1950) was a remarkable world traveler whose hands-on fieldwork added immeasurably to the base of ornithological knowledge. In the early-to-mid 20th century, the native Californian obtained and preserved tens of thousands of specimens and collected data for some of the most important bird collections in the world. Institutions including The Natural History Museum in Tring, England, American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York, California Academy of Sciences (CAS) in San Francisco, and Museum of Vertebrate Zoology (MVZ) at the University of California, Berkeley hold Beck specimens.

Many of the mounted specimens in the Monterey County Birds exhibit at the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History (PGMNH) are also Beck's work.

Read Ryan Masters' May 25, 2006 article about Rollo Beck from the Monterey County Weekly here.

 

The Early California Years (1870-1896)

Collecting for Lord Rothschild (1897-1898)

Monterey Bay Collecting (1903-1910)

Academy Galapagos Expedition (1905-1906)

Collecting for Bent in Alaska (1911-1912)

Brewster-Sanford Expedition (1912-1917)

Whitney South Seas Expedition (1920-1929)

Back Home in Planada (1930-1950)
Bird Specimens at the PGMNH
Artifacts

Map of Beck's World Travels
Exhibit Credits
Links

Page created April 28, 2006. Last updated May 26, 2006.
Page copyright 2006 by the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History.