24 Collecting Abroad, Preserving at Home: Titian Ramsay Peale Ii, American Entomologist and Collector
In: Naturalists in the FieldSearch for other papers by Robert McCracken Peck in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Purchase instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
Abstract
As part of a productive career collecting and illustrating insects and other natural history specimens for his father’s museum in Philadelphia and the newly formed Smithsonian Institution in Washington, dc, the American naturalist-artist Titian Ramsay Peale II (1799-1885) developed a technique for preserving insects (primarily moths and butterflies) by sealing them in metal-lined glass boxes that were constructed like books. Peale’s patented techniques enabled his collection to survive to the present day, making it the oldest, intact insect collection in North America. Now preserved at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia (where Peale served as a curator), Peale’s boxes contain insects collected by him and others in North and South America.