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FW: Obit: Phoebe Snetsinger, 68, Dies; Held Record for Bird Sightings
- To: "'carolinabirds@duke.edu'" <carolinabirds@duke.edu>
- Subject: FW: Obit: Phoebe Snetsinger, 68, Dies; Held Record for Bird Sightings
- From: Derb Carter <DerbC@selcnc.org>
- Date: Thu, 2 Dec 1999 10:29:13 -0500
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
With apologies because this does not pertain directly to NC/SC birds I
thought those on carolinabirds would be interested in the following.
Derb Carter
Chapel Hill, NC
> Date: 12/02/99
> EDF Program: Ecosystem Restoration
> Publication: New York Times
> Headline: Obit: Phoebe Snetsinger, 68, Dies; Held Record for Bird
> Sightings
> EDF Quoted:
> Reporter: DOUGLAS MARTIN
> http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/obit-p-snetstinger.html
>
>
> December 2, 1999
>
>
> Phoebe Snetsinger, 68, Dies; Held Record for Bird Sightings
>
> By DOUGLAS MARTIN
>
> hoebe Snetsinger, who saw and recorded more birds than
> anybody else, died on Nov. 23 in a van accident on a
> birding
> expedition to Madagascar, shortly after viewing an
> exceptionally
> rare
> Helmet vanga. She was 68 and lived in Webster Groves, Mo., a
> suburb
> of St. Louis.
>
> Birding went from a hobby to a passion for Mrs. Snetsinger
> on the
> day in
> 1981 that a doctor told her she had an incurable cancer,
> with
> less than a
> year to live. Rejecting therapy, she took off to Alaska on a
> scheduled
> trip, her first long-distance journey simply to see birds.
>
> "She came back and felt good," her husband, David, said.
> "Things
> just
> started snowballing from there."
>
> Mrs. Snetsinger liked to say her avian ardor "began with a
> death
> sentence," and her relentless energy reflected that level of
> urgency as her
> cancer went into the first of several remissions. Family
> members
> and
> friends could not imagine her without binoculars, floppy
> hat,
> sneakers,
> telescope and other field gear as she scurried around the
> globe
> on scores
> of bird tours, most costing more than $5,000. An inheritance
> paid
> the
> bills; she supplied the boundless energy. She said she spent
> more
> time in
> the world's jungles, mountains and other wild areas than at
> home.
>
>
> There were setbacks, as the cancer, melanoma, recurred every
> five
> years
> or so, only to go into remission again. But her record, as
> verified by the
> American Birding Association, was sighting about 8,400
> birds, or
> nearly
> 85 percent of the species now estimated to exist, more than
> 2,000
> birds
> ahead of her nearest competitor.
>
> "She was a celebrity in our bunch," said Bret Whitney, a
> co-founder of
> Field Guides, a tour operator based in Austin, Tex.
>
> Mrs. Snetsinger was traveling on one of the group's tours
> when
> the van
> overturned. Whitney said she apparently died instantly.
>
> "She gave so much to the birding world and had so much more
> left
> to
> give," said G. Stuart Keith, the birding association's first
> president. At the
> highest tier of birding, it was a common joke to
> differentiate
> between
> Phoebe Snetsinger and the phoebe, a genus of flycatchers.
>
> Genera, or large groups of species (as in the genus Homo of
> Homo
> sapiens), were of considerable importance to Mrs.
> Snetsinger, who
> kept
> a separate list of those that have only a single species,
> known
> as
> monotypic genera. Her list of more than 2,000 such genera
> far
> surpassed
> anyone else's, said Whitney, who also works as a research
> associate at
> Louisiana State University.
>
> She also kept extensive notes on subspecies, using index
> cards as
> a
> catalog until switching in recent months to a computer from
> the
> Remington portable typewriter she had used since college.
>
> Her subspecies notes, in whatever format, are important
> because
> many
> of the birds have now been reclassified as species. When she
> started,
> there were 8,500 officially named species, compared with
> about
> 10,000
> now. A spokeswoman for the American Museum of Natural
> History
> said
> some scientists believed there could eventually be as many
> as
> 18,000
> named separate bird species.
>
> This means that her life list will almost certainly grow
> posthumously. "She
> has birds in escrow," Whitney said.
>
> Mrs. Snetsinger was born in Lake Zurich, Ill., where she
> attended
> a
> one-room elementary school with only two other students. At
> 11,
> she
> met her future husband, then 13, in 4-H clubs.
>
> She graduated from Swarthmore College as a German major, and
> then
> taught science at the Baldwin School, a private girls school
> in
> Bryn
> Mawr, Pa. When Snetsinger returned from service in Korea,
> they
> both
> attended graduate school and she earned a master's degree in
> German
> literature.
>
> They had four children, all of whom survive. They are
> Thomas, of
> Corvallis, Ore.; Penny, of Woodbridge, Conn.; Carol, of
> Missoula,
> Mont., and Susan, of Tempe, Ariz. All but Penny pursued
> careers
> relating to birds, Thomas as a researcher in endangered bird
> species for
> the Federal government, Carol as a bird researcher in Alaska
> and
> Montana, and Susan as a student of the spotted owl in the
> Northwest.
>
> In 1965, a friend took Mrs. Snetsinger birding for the first
> time
> in
> Minnesota, and when her husband took a corporate job in
> Missouri
> she
> pursued her interest with a group of birders. (Birders
> adamantly
> spurn the
> term "birdwatcher" in the belief that it suggests a lack of
> gravity.) The
> group visited local woods and prairies each Thursday
> afternoon.
>
> After birding came to represent a new lease on life to her,
> Mrs.
> Snetsinger began to take longer and longer trips. She was
> hooked
> when
> she visited Kenya and saw 500 different birds in three
> weeks. Her
> odyssey was aided by new technology for recording bird
> sounds,
> greater
> access to more and more remote habitats and the increasing
> numbers of
> tours being offered.
>
> The depth of her enthusiasm is suggested by her response to
> a
> fall she
> took about six months ago while climbing a mountain in the
> Philippines:
> she stayed in the field for two additional weeks to see more
> birds.
>
> The whole idea of listing birds, or at least the seriousness
> of
> the pursuit, is
> also sometimes criticized, or at least satirized. Indeed, it
> is
> called "the
> game" by birders themselves. "It's like collecting stamps or
> baseball
> cards," said Paul J. Baicich, editor of Birding, the
> magazine of
> the
> American Birding Association.
>
> Snetsinger said his wife's competitive spirit was kept
> hidden,
> though he
> did not deny it existed. In a 1996 interview, she insisted
> that
> she wanted
> to play down her quantitative quest. "I'm going back to
> being a
> birder,
> not a lister," she said.
>
> Ultimately, she felt very lucky, as she explained in an
> article
> to be
> published in next February's issue of Birding.
>
> "Birding is the best and most exciting pursuit in the world,
> a
> glorified
> never-ending one," Mrs. Snetsinger wrote. "And the whole
> experience of
> a foreign trip, whether you see 10 new birds or 500, is
> simply
> too good
> to miss."
>
>
>
>
>
>
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> _______________________________________________
> |-----------------+-----------------+-----------------+---------------
> --|
> |Created By: |Allan Margolin |Created On: |12/02/99
> 08:57:41|
> | | | |AM
> |
> |-----------------+-----------------+-----------------+---------------
> --|
> |Last Modified By:|Allan Margolin |Last Modified On:|12/02/99
> 08:58:50|
> | | | |AM
> |
> |-----------------+-----------------+-----------------+---------------
> --|
>
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>
> Daniel J. Whittle
> Attorney
> North Carolina Environmental Defense Fund
> 2500 Blue Ridge Road, Suite 330
> Raleigh, NC 27607-6454
> 919/881-2601 (phone)
> 919/881-2607 (fax)
>