Chapter being established in 1947. Weve fought against development in the everglades big cyprus this came bay and over the years have continued to do so as we do today. So ive been a member of Tropical Audubon Society for over 30 years and found it just a great way as i move to miami to learn about our local region and the natural areas around here. So i encourage everyone to go to our website at tropical audubon. Org and take a look at our events. We have field trips every weekend throughout the year bird trips mostly oft. To go see eagles because of course as birders. We do see eagles regularly and a few people really have recognized that florida has one of the largest concentrations of bald eagles and the United States we have over 1,500 nesting nesting pairs and audubon in general has a program called eagle watch and these are people that keep an eye on eagles nests and just monitor them for making sure that the eagles are safe as they grow and we actually have a nest right here in south florida. Not far from where we sit right now. Um, this pair of eagles is nested pretty regularly here and um last year, they nested with two eaglets, but unfortunately had a loss of one eaglet as it fell and then a second following out of the nest suffered a broken wing luckily because of the audubon eagle watched we were aware of this and two of our local heroes gentlemen by the name of lloyd brown and ron mcgill save the eglet rehabilitated it and released it in near Everglades National park. Um, they also decided to climb up there and stabilize and and really secured this nest and while they were up there. They put up a couple cameras. So another thing i encourage you to do is go to sue miami eagle watch or eagle tv. Either way, you cant miss it and it will show you live pictures of the nest as we speak. Its a wonderful nighttime camera as well. You will those who eaglets sleeping. Up up and down. Theyre actually quite big right now and still have about four weeks before they fledged. So i encourage everyone to go on to that eagle cam and watch the excitement of the mom and dad whose names are ron and rita and the two eglets are one and r2. So thats our local story of the bald eagle. So let me introduce you to our author jack davis is an environmental historian who is a pulitzer prizewinning author with the book the gulf the making of an american sea but i also want to tell you about his other books and everglades provenance. Marjory Stoneman Douglas and the American Environmental century, and of course now the bald eagle the improbable journey of an american bird this in this book jack tracks the history of our Great National symbol and its ups and downs along with the history of america and our relationship to the natural world. With these titles. Its no surprise that jack lives right here in florida, and it is great with great honor that i introduce the rothman family chair in the humanities at the university of florida, which is my alma mater. Lets welcome jackie davis thank you. By the way, 1947 when as you know when tropical audubon was started was a watershed year for south florida. Of course, thats the year in which everybodys National Park was dedicated. Its also the year just a few weeks for the part was dedicated that margie Stoneman Douglas published the everglades river of grass. And as joe said i wrote this book about Martin Stoneman king and she had tremendous amount of respect for tropical audubon, and i think was her favorite organization next to of course friends of the everglades and the one she found it and joe browder too had tremendous respect for tropical audubon. Not so much national, but definitely tropical audubon. And so thank you for what you do and and i of course we should thank florida audubon for their ego watch program, which is a very valuable program on many levels. I wanted to start first of all, thank thank you for coming out and a beautiful evening out there. I dont know why youre inside here with me, but im sure that you are. I want to start by telling you why i wrote this book and and im going to have a a pop quiz question for you, too. So i wrote this book for a number of reasons one. The after i finish the book on the gulf of mexico when i was looking around for another book. I realize that nobody had written other than scientists, you know bald eagle. I mean theyre probably. A thousand or two thousand books on the bald eagle. Most of them are pictured books childrens books, you know coffee table books a number of signs of books and but as far as a cultural Natural History of the bald eagle, nobody had written that story since 1996 in that book focuses really on the restoration period after ddt, very nice book written by bruce beans title eagles plume, but before that, the person who comes who wrote a more comprehensive. Cultural and Natural History, the bald eagle was from this area. And her name was anybody know polly. Oh, i was supposed to ask you the name Holly Redford and youre familiar. Poly redford. Yes, and i believe she was involved with tropical, right . Yeah, following redford award that we give out. Okay. Do you know about her and she published this book in 1963 . Why is 1963 a pivotal year in the history of bald eagles . Somebody know other than poly redfords book, which is really about raccoons and in bald eagles. It was entitled eagle and raccoon. Discuss 1963 was when the nesting population of bald eagle in the lower 48 reached his nadir across the lower 48 there according to a a population count conducted by audubon. There were only 487 nesting pairs in the lower 48. And coincidentally polony redford who lived it. I believe coconut grove. Yes, and she was very good friends with marjor Stoneman Douglas. And she published her coincidentally published a book in 1963. So anyway, i saw a need there. To tell this story a lot has happened it just in the 21st century and in the history of the bald eagle, so that that was one reason the other reason is that i wanted as an Environmental Writer and i dont write for my colleagues. I dont write academic books. I write i write books for the general public and i wanted to write an environmental story. That would reach a broader audience than the usual audience that reads environmental books and primarily i wanted to reach across the political divide. I want to reach the broad political spectrum and you know who doesnt love the bald eagle right whether youre right red white and Blue American or a bird or a tree hugger or all of those things together you love the bald eagle. Its one of those those birds when you see it cross in the sky. You poked a person in the ribs next to you and you know and point everybody gets excited when they see it baldi home and it really is a wonderful site, but also, when we reflect on our environmental past we tend to focus on riders or certainly guilty of those we tend to focus on the the grim and the tragic and you know, theyre these doomsday stories we hear all the time and i wanted to give is a break from that and until an environmental story. That was a more positive uplifting story, you know, an environmental Success Story and the bald eagle is certainly that it has the its history the bald eagles history with the us has its certainly has this tragic moments horrific her horrific moments and but there are also a couple of redemption periods. I call him a redemption moments and and ultimately its one of the Great American conservation success stories. And so i wanted to tell that story to reach that broader audience. Also, i didnt know much about the bald eagle before i started writing this book and learn of you know, and thats true with anybody riding a nonfiction you you learn a lot about your subject a lot of things you had no idea and you come across all sorts of surprises. The course. I knew it was on the make sure lets see if i can figure this out people commonly believe that ben franklin compared the the morality and thats the word he used or the bald eagle with with the wild turkey and described the bald eagle. Is this rank coward and thief whereas the the turkey was a normal bird and he expressed his discontent with the bald eagle being a representative of the nation and he did do that in a letter to his daughter in 178 1784 and and then of course the story goes that he loves me for the bald eagle to be the National Bird. She mean lobbied for the turkey to be the National Bird that part of the story is not true. He never advocated the turkey. Be on the seal in the United States or to be the National Bird he did he was served on it honest on a committee in congress to design a seal along with Thomas Jefferson and and john adams, but he did not propose the turkey it proposed something entirely different and im not going to tell you what it was or who it was because i want you to read the book. And but and the other myth is we or the other misunderstanding about the bald eagle and the National Bird is we dont have a National Bird. A National Bird has never been appointed if you will by congress or the president as as congress has selected the bison to be the National Enamel and the oak to be the National Tree congress has never anointed the bald eagle as the as the National Bird. It is legitimately a National Symbol and its a powerful one as we know and it it required six years. Three congressional committees and 14 men delegates in the Continental Congress as well as consultants and artists. To finally get to this there that committee i mentioned with Jefferson Adams and franklin that was the First Committee that was appointed to design a seal and they failed miserably. And as in a second committee, as did a Third Committee and finally in 1782 charles thompson, who was the secretary of the Continental Congress . It took over and said we need to see hill where were on the verge of becoming a legitimately independent nation. Were gonna were gonna beat the you know, the pants off the british air and another couple years and we dont have a see a National Seal and we need one. So hes the one who proposed putting the bald eagle on the National Seal now eagles on coach of arms and and National Coach of arms and and nation seals date back to the the ancients the greeks and and the romans but those all those eagles proceeding this one or non orthological they are just your generic eagle figure and that represent no particular species. And so this is the first one that represents a an actual species in thompson insisted that it be a balding or is he called it an american bald eagle be put on the seal and its the appropriate bird for a couple of reasons one is that the bald eagle is only in north america . And there are only two eagles that live in north america the golden eagle and the bald eagle the golden eagle lives in the other parts of the northern hemisphere, but the bald eagle stays here unless it gets lost a couple bald eagles have showed up in ireland in in the past juveniles and you know isnt always the juveniles and but it lives only here and the other reason i argue that it was. The ideal image for the great seal of the United States is look at that look at the the countenance. Look at the expression on that bird. You know it has that dont tread on me look, you know and the eye of an adult eagle is just about the size of an adult humans eye and if youve ever seen a bald eagle sitting in its nest an adult only go sinningness is had above the rim looking at it through a scope or binoculars. Have you done this the eye is what really stands out. Its its in you know when youre looking at it through a scope. Its looking right back at you and knows youre watching it and and it has this permanent ridge. This is super orbital bone above its eyes. And so it has this permanent ridge which serves as a sun visor for the bald eagle, but for us thats what gives it that stern look and so it courage sovereignty or freedom and so it was an ideal symbol for the United States. It wasnt a popular image before the great seal, but it became hugely popular, but unfortunately what wasnt as popular as the image of the bald eagle was the bald eagle itself the species. Its its a its a top predator or an apex predator and it was treated like any other predator at the time throughout the 19th century and early 20th century. And what did we do it predator . What did americans do it predators . They eradicated them the wolves the coyotes the bears and the mountain lions and the eagle. The bald eagle was one of those predators that they sought to eradicate a bald eagle scene was the bald eagle to be shot. Because it was accused of stealing livestock. Itll still chickens. Itll take a chicken any day of the week chickens are like lowhanging fruit to them is one rancher a chicken rancher told me and they bet because they can carry away chicken. Theyre light enough for them too. They can lift at most five pounds a large eagle can lift about five pounds, but they were accused of flying away with calves and and in pigs and sheep all sorts of things all these reports of bald eagles stealing livestock T Gilbert Pearson a floridian who was many years that president of the florida of National Audubon maintained in the early 20th centuries president maintain that he knew of the bald eagle that flew away with a sheep. That was twice its weight. And carried it for five miles. I dont know how i knew five miles. I dont know, but made me figure it out. It got exhausted. It was you ultimately too much for it and mothers were warned. Dont leave your infant unto outdoors unattended unless you want to bald eagle to fly away with it mcguffey reader or mcgoverns reader which is which next to the bible was the most popular book in the 19th century. It was a primer for immigrants learning to reading english and and children had a story for decades about a ball about an eagle flying away with a child to in taking it back to its nest and the image the drawing that went with the story is of a girl in the towns of an eagle and this girl has to be at least six or seven years old. And one of Thomas Edisons earliest films rescued from an eagles nest. 1908 film Thomas Edisons edison studios, i say it wasnt a film that he produced himself but 1908 silent film was about a lumberjack and his wife who lived with their child in a cabin in woods and one day the husband skips off to cut down trees and mother leaves their child outside alone while she goes back in the cabin and a bald eagle on eagle was actually bald eagle on wires. I think i have an image here. Area. Oh so look at these guys, so this was taken in 1930s. And dont you know those children ended up in therapy at some point. I mean look at would you want to run into those guys anywhere i sure wouldnt and abort eagle unfortunately did. And what was interesting about the shooting of these eagles is that first of all, i did a search on newspaper dot newspapers. Com from 1850 to 1920 with the words in quotation marks bald eagle shot and i came up with Something Like a hundred and forty thousand hits. And my Research Assistant and i we couldnt go through all 140,000, but we went through quite a few of them. There was very little repetition, you know newspaper reporting, you know, the same bald eagle incident and new the newspapers in those days did not these shootings whatsoever. And they treated them as if somebody had caught this large. Bass down at the lake and in of course when they would report the weight of the bass, they always reported the wingspan. And the weight of the bird and how it was killed where theres clubbed when it was shot who shot it without any combination whatsoever. And so and its all based on these myths that the bald eagle. Was going was harming livestock. And that it was an unnecessary economic competition for Livestock Farmers and fishermen. The territory of alaska from 1917 to 1952 had a bounty on bald eagles that and ultimately it paid bounty on 128 more than 128,000 bald eagles during that period they were accused of stealing salmon and and and foxes. So competing with the fox fur industry in the salmon industry. They generally only pray on spawned out salmon, which are not marketable. And anyway, this is from the Thomas Edison film rescuing from an eagles nest and this eagle on prop wires flies in grabs his child, which i knew is over a year old because she had appeared in a film a year before and you can see shes on wires too those and those thats back in the days when there were no protection for child actors apparently and what is fascinating about this movie is who played the father who the star was in the movie . And do you know the name dw griffith . Yes, dw griffith is the the who drew the person who directed the birth of a nation the film 1915 15 film that led to the rebirth of the kuukalaks klan and the critics pandem is an actor in this movie and he decided not to act anymore. He went into directing too bad, you know, maybe if theyve been kinder to him he would have stayed as an actor and never made that film. But so by the 19 by the early 20th century. That actually by the late 19th by the late 1980s the ball and eagle has disappeared from a number of states across the country at the time of european contact. To estimated size of