From the Cataloger's Desk - Ex Libris AMNH, A Scripta Librarians
by Iris Lee on
Penelope Bodry-Sanders is a woman of many talents. Before joining the Museum, she was a singer and actress on Broadway. Her AMNH profile describes the variety of work she accomplished during her nearly 20 years here:
“She supervised and cared for bird colonies; preserved archival photographs, films, memorabilia, and other materials; curated a special exhibition on the history and accomplishments of the great explorer and collector Carl Akeley; and wrote Akeley’s biography. As Education coordinator for Discovery Tours, she designed and developed the educational component of the Museum’s travel program.”
Bodry-Sanders is an artist, a writer, a performer, an educator, and a founder and former Executive Director of the Lemur Conservation Foundation (LCF) in Florida. This year, she published a memoir titled A Conspiracy of Lemurs: Turning a Conservation Dream into Reality. Her life’s journey is fascinating and inspiring, to say the least.
The second published work I want to highlight is an article appearing in The Evolution of Paleontological Art. Written by current library staff, Mai Reitmeyer, Rebecca Morgan, and Tom Baione, "Beyond Charles Knight: Women paleoartists at the American Museum of Natural History in the early twentieth century" uncovers women in science, highlighting the work and legacies of Elisabeth Rungius Fulda, Helen Ziska, Lindsay Morris Sterling, and Margret Joy Flinsch Buba. Though these individuals are overshadowed by Knight, perhaps they will rise to the level of popularity deserving of their talent. Their illustrations and contributions in paleoart are worth a closer look, not to mention their sense of humor, as seen in a previous post by Maya Naunton, Project Archivist in the Department of Vertebrate Paleontology. Fun and seriously skilled company, for sure.
I mean, could Charles Knight depict the hatching of baby dinosaurs better? I think not.
Here are the other wonderful additions to our collection. Click on the links to see the lists by month.
October 2023
November 2023
December 2023
The Library offers a space for staff to view our current literature along with recent journals in person. Come by and view them before they are permanently shelved in our stacks. Happy New Year, friends!
This entry was written by Iris Lee, Cataloging and Metadata Librarian.