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Rollo Beck-Old-School Collector, Member of an Endangered Species

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Rollo Beck-Old-School Collector, Member of an Endangered Species RoIloBeck Old-schoolcollector, memberofan endanteed species Frank A. Pitelka tific merits of Robert Cushman rhateverMurphy'sthe scholarlyOceanic and Birdsscien- of SouthAmerica, and they were and still areoutstanding, the database was pri- marilythe result of "thefield worker" (italicsmine). This pivotalfigure for that great work was Rollo Howard Beck(1870-1950). Murphy, summariz- inghis South American field program, made Beck's role perfectly clear: "...The treasure obtained by Mr. Beck and his courageoushelpmeet is a monument to rare skill and indomi- tablepersistence." "Up todate [1936], it is safeto say,no otherornithologi- cal collectorhas carried through a sim- ilar campaign..." And again, "He RolloBeck (4th J•om left) with other members of hislast Galapagos Expedition which was standstoday as the most successful oneand one-half years in duration and was sponsored bythe California Academy ofSciences. worker in this branch of ornithology Herethey are aboard the yacht ^½ademy, bought especially forthe expedition, which set sail that'theworld hasknown." The speci- onJune 28, 1905.Photo/Archives. California Academy of Sciences. mens obtained for the American Mu- seumof NaturalHistory in New York, tionand identification hardly relaxed. 1929.The first phase began in the 1890s overfive years (1912-1917) totalled 7853, In hisremaining years. he kept in touch whenhe collected birds in various parts plusa "greatbody of associateddata, withJoseph Grinnell and later Alden of California.In 1894,he joined the suchas nests,eggs, notes, and photo- H. Miller, successivedirectors of the AmericanOrnithologists' Union and graphs. "If this openingstatement Museumof VertebrateZoology at the the CooperOrnithological Club and seemsto mimic an overtureto an early Universityof California,Berkeley. In developedfriendships with local col- Verdi opera,one hasmerely to read 1931,Beck sought ¸rinnell's help in lectorsas well as notables such as Rob- moreof Murphy'sintroductory chap- obtainingcollecting permits. and this err Ridgway,Charles Bendire and ter, and Beck'sfive-page autobiogra- sponsorshipcontinued through 1949. WilfredOsgood. His reputation as a phy(as of 1929)therein, to recognize Beckkept up an intermittentcorre- hard-working,efficient collector spread the justiceof the plauditsMurphy spondencewithGrinnell and other Mu- eastward,and in 1897came a "bolt- gave Beck. seumof Vertebrate Zoology personnel, out-of-the-blue"opportunity to be a After the South American years, sendingshipments totalling over 1500 memberof a Rothschild Expedition to Beck went on to field work abroad for specimens,mainly from the San Joa- theGalapagos Islands. This was his in- someten more years,primarily in the quinValley. The last letter to Beck in troductiontooceanic birds. He made westerntropical Pacific,also for the theMuseum's files, dated August 14, threemore trips to the Galapagos. The American Museum of Natural History. 1950,acknowledges thearrival of two lastof these,in theearly 1900 s, was By 1930,he andMrs. Becksettled on boxeswith 155 bird skins, three months sponsoredby the CaliforniaAcademy ruralproperty in Planada.in thesouth- shortof hisdeath. of Sciences,whose director, L. M. ernpart of thecentral California Valley, Beck'slife as an ornithological col- Loomis,was interested inmarine birds, wherethey grew orchards of apricots, lectorpassed through three phases. especiallythe"Tubinares" orprocell- figs, and almonds. The affiliationwith the American ariforms.This relationshipwith the But Beck's drive to collect birds a.nd Museumof NaturalHistory was the Academycontinued, with Beck collect- to chasedown questions of distribu- secondphase, spanning theyears 1912- ingmarine birds off California,the Volume40, Number 3 385 vent for somesharp comments on the damageto fruit causedby songbirds. He wasfcisty. as well as generous.For staff and students at MVZ, the tradi- tional box of fruit was a special oc- casion. Grinnell to Beck, June 27, 1932: "We, members of MVZ staff, do hereby transmit to you herewith our stomach-feltappreciation of that box of cots. Remember. please. that such fruits ripen sour in the Bay region. We get nothing locally produced to compare with such fruit as yours, in which the sugars are brought out under the hot sun!" With this annual gift of fruit and in other ways, Beck quietly expressedhis appreciationto Beckwith his wife,Ida, picnickingand photographing among adult and immatureRockhopper Grinnell and his succcssors for re- Penguinson one of the Falkland Islands. This picture was taken betweenOctober 13, 1915 and February2, 1916, during whichtime the Beckswere on the Falklandson the Brewster- spondingto and sustaininghis passion SanfordExpeditionfor theAmerican Museum of Natural History. Photo/Archives. California for collectingspecimens and discuss- Academyof Sciences. ing the findings. I must have met Beck first some time west coast of Mexico. and Costa Rica. of comments between Beck and Grin- in the early 1940s,as he visitedthe Mu- A Hawaiian trip was proposed by nell. In February 1938, Beck wrote to seumoccasionally and attendedannual Loomis, but was never launched. Beck, Grinnell, "The intriguingpossibilities meetingsand also, now and then, the following his marriage in 1907, asked of Planadaas a collectingground, now Northern Division meetings of the Loomis for a raise but was denied be- that the Seven Seas are behind me, CooperOrnithological Society. But we cause of financial constraints in the loom larger and largcr before mc as beganto get better acquaintedin 1945 Academy's budget. At a higher rate your identificationsgive riseto conjec- when, prompted by a paper published of pay, he began, in 1908, to collect tureafter conjecture!" Beck was a spir- in 1940by R. T. Orr on subspecificsta- for the Museum of Vertebrate Zool- ited, good-humoredman, and did not tus of dowitchers in California. he col- ogy and continued so for three years. hesitateto tease(as I was to learn first- lected specimensmainly in the San In 1911,L. C. Sanford, a benefactor of hand later). By this time bird skinning JoaquinValley, but alsonear SanJose, the American Museum,hired him away was a form of knitting for him, and he at the southend of San FranciscoBay. from the Museum of Vertebrate Zool- becamenotorious as a whiz in speci- Orr reported the Short-billed form to ogywith a "considerablybetter" salary, menpreparation, leading to somctimes be five times more common that the and Beck went to Alaska with A. C. greasy products and curators' com- Long-billed form. Beck viewed this as Bent and a recent college graduate plaints,probably because in hisenthu- anotherpossible case of "conjecture." namedAlexander Wetmore, collecting siasm he was loaded down with too ashis own collectingdid not agreewith in the Aleutians and on the mainland many birds to process.His enthusiasm Orr. He bcganaccumulating specimens near Nome. Then, from 1912, followed asa sea-faringcollector surfaced briefly of dowitchersslowly in the early 1940s, the secondphase of travel and collect- in 1946, a sign late in life of longing exchangingcomment about them with ing in South American waters and on for the old daysof SouthAmerica and Alden Miller. But by early 1946, his the islands of the western Pacific. the western Pacific. In August 1946, passionfor dowitchershit a peak, and The thirdphase spanned the 21 years Beckacquired a cabinin PacificGrove, one day I was called down to the file 1930-1950, when Beck was a resident on Monterey Bay, and soughtto col- room of the Museum, where there still Californianand pursuedcollecting as lect marine birds as he had some 40 is a long table for incomingand out- a sideline,but still with enterpriseand yearsearlier. A specialcollecting per- going specimenshipments, to meet gusto. Beck read the literature and re- mit was arranged. Right away, he someonewho had broughtin two large peatedly sent specimensto Grinnell, collectedterns that presentedidentifi- boxesof specimens.It wasRollo Beck. collected because of some cue he had cation problems he called to Alden When I approachedhim. aswe greeted pickedup from his recent readings. Miller's attention. In his later years, eachother, he wasspilling, helter skel- Here he was, in the heydayot trinomi- with his orchard maintenance routines ter, onto the table the contents of one, alism (the concept and practice of more or lesssettled in an annualcycle, then the other box, heap after heap of subspeciesnaming), untrainedas a tax- Beck'sactive mind seemed constantly well-made dowitcher specimens--311 onomist, but alert to complexitiesof to seek exercise in the bird world. in all, and all of them of the Long- racial variation in Californian birds, There was a marvelous spinoff for billed form. That moment really got both residentand wintcring, the latter the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology our friendshipon the road, and in the often in populationsof mixed races. from those Planadadays. Beck'sship- next five years, we were often in touch Thus, SongSparrows, Savannah Spar- ments to the Museum included, almost regarding dowitchers and other bird rows, White-crownedSparrows, Redr annuallyuntil 1949,boxes of fresh fruit matters.The resultwas my immersion wingedBlackbirds, towhces, juncocs, from hisranch, usually apricots, some- in the distribution,taxonomy, and no- Horned Larks andothers were targets times figs. These occasionsgave Beck menclatural chaos of American dow- 386 AmericanBirds, Fall 1986 itchers,ending with the publicationof to the perspicacityand efforts of the members .... " a monographin 1950' which
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