Having been purchased from the Russians in 1867, Alaska's biodiversity was a subject of intense interest to the naturalist and scientific community. Budding naturalist Edward W. Nelson (1855-1934) came to the attention of Smithsonian Secretary Spencer F. Baird, who used his influence to Nelson get attached to Signal Corps of the U.S. Army, knowing this would give him copious amounts of free time to study the flora and fauna of northwestern Alaska. In the fall of 1881, Edward W. Nelson's four year assignment as a weather observer near the Bering Strait in Alaska drew to a close. Team up with digital volunteers to transcribe this field journal spanning September and October of that year, the last Alaska field journal in the Smithsonian Institution Archives collection of Nelson's papers.
Having been purchased from the Russians in 1867, Alaska's biodiversity was a subject of intense interest to the naturalist and scientific community. Budding naturalist Edward W. Nelson (1855-1934) came to the attention of Smithsonian Secretary Spencer F. Baird, who used his influence to Nelson get attached to Signal Corps of the U.S. Army, knowing this would give him copious amounts of free time to study the flora and fauna of northwestern Alaska. In the fall of 1881, Edward W. Nelson's four year assignment as a weather observer near the Bering Strait in Alaska drew to a close. Team up with digital volunteers to transcribe this field journal spanning September and October of that year, the last Alaska field journal in the Smithsonian Institution Archives collection of Nelson's papers.
Learn more about Nelson through the Edward William Nelson and Edward Alfonso Goldman Collection at the Smithsonian Institution Archives.