Summary Information
Arlie William Schorger Papers
1912-1971
- Schorger, A. W. (Arlie William), 1884-1972
Mss 388
0.8 c.f. (2 archives boxes)
Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)
Papers of A. W. Schorger, an ornithologist, mammalogist, research chemist, and University of Wisconsin professor of wildlife ecology. Included are five volumes of field notes recording sixty years of observations of birds and other wildlife, especially in southern Wisconsin. Also included are correspondence, primarily from Francis Zirrer, a northwestern Wisconsin naturalist; and clippings relating to wildlife and the work of other naturalists.
English
http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-mss00388 ↑ Bookmark this ↑
Biography/History
Arlie William Schorger, noted ornithologist and wildlife ecologist, was born on September 6, 1884 in Republic, Ohio. In 1906, he graduated from Wooster College (Wooster, Ohio), and received his M.A. in Chemistry from Ohio State University two years later.
He was employed as an assistant chemist in the U.S. Bureau of Standards and in the U.S. Bureau of Internal Revenue in Washington, D.C., and, beginning in 1909, as a research chemist in the Forest Products Laboratory of the U.S. Forest Service in Madison, Wisconsin. After receiving his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin in 1916, he became director of chemical research at the C. F. Burgess Laboratories in Madison. From 1931 to 1950, still living in Madison, he was president of the Burgess Cellulose Company of Freeport, Illinois.
Although his education and professional career was in the field of chemistry, Schorger actively pursued a lifelong interest in ornithology and mammalogy, and was recognized as a leading authority on the history of game populations in the Great Lakes region. In 1951 he became Professor of Wildlife Ecology at the University of Wisconsin, was voted emeritus status in 1955, and served until 1959 as a commissioner of the State Department of Conservation.
Schorger was awarded the William Brewster Medal, the nation's highest honor in the field of ornithological literature, for his book, The Passenger Pigeon, Its Natural History and Extinction, published in 1955. Other writings include The Chemistry of Cellulose and Wood (1926), The Wild Turkey, Its History and Domestication (1966), and many papers on ornithology, mammalogy, and the history of wildlife. He also held a number of chemical patents, and was a member of many scientific and honorary societies, including the American Chemical Society, the American Ornithologists Union, the American Society of Mammalogists, and the National Wildlife Society. Schorger was president of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters in 1942 and 1943, and a director of the National Audubon Society from 1957 to 1959.
He and his wife, Margaret Davison Schorger, who died in 1962, had two sons, William D. and John R. Schorger. A. W. Schorger died on May 26, 1972.
Scope and Content Note
The Arlie William Schorger collection is comprised of correspondence, field notes, clippings, and a small number of miscellaneous papers.
The Correspondence, 1934-1949 and 1968, consists primarily of letters to Schorger from his friend, Francis Zirrer. Zirrer, a fellow ornithologist and naturalist, sent many detailed accounts of wildlife sighted in the vicinity of his residences in the northwestern Wisconsin communities of Birchwood and Hayward. Also included are several of Schorger's responses to Zirrer, a few of Schorger's exchanges with others regarding the Zirrer correspondence, and a letter, 1945, to Schorger from his son, William.
Schorger's Field Notes, 1912-1971, consist of five volumes of handwritten journal entries recording his observations of birds and other wildlife. The dated entries are generally terse but detailed accounts of the field observations he made in southern Wisconsin several times a week for nearly sixty years, and on many longer trips to northern Wisconsin and other parts of the country. His usual practice was to carry, in addition to binoculars, a pencil and small note pad with which to record weather conditions, behavior of species observed, and other notes from which he wrote his entry for the day.
The Clippings, 1934-1955, taken primarily from Madison and Milwaukee newspapers, are reports of news events involving wildlife, and accounts of the work of naturalists, including Schorger himself. Due to their deteriorating condition, these clippings have been photocopied. There are additional clippings mounted throughout Schorger's field notes, especially at the end of the first volume.
The Miscellaneous Papers consist of bird lists, notes on nests found, and directions to a few bird watching areas in Dane County, Wisconsin.
Administrative/Restriction Information
Presented by A. W. Schorger, Madison, Wisconsin, November 22, 1968; and by the Estate of A. W. Schorger via Robert A. McCabe, Madison, Wisconsin, July 17, 1975. Accession Number: M68-398; M75-315
Processed by Jane Wolff, November 16, 1976.
Contents List
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Box
1
Folder
1
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Correspondence, 1934, 1935, 1937-1939, 1941-1946, 1949, 1968
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Field Notes
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Box
1
Folder
2
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Volume I, 1912, May 4 - 1928, December 31
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Box
1
Folder
3
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Volume II, 1929, January 6 - 1940, September 2
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Box
1
Folder
4
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Volume III, 1940, September 5 - 1949, May 20
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Box
1
Folder
5
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Volume IV, 1949, May 21 - 1956, March 31
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Box
2
Folder
1
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Volume V, 1956, April 1 - 1971, May 15
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Box
2
Folder
2
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Clippings, 1934, 1937, 1940-1947, 1951, 1952, 1955
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Box
2
Folder
3
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Miscellaneous Papers, 1925-1933, 1936-1937, 1940, 1949, 1956, undated
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