Bailey, Alfred Marshall, 1894-1978
Name Entries
person
Bailey, Alfred Marshall, 1894-1978
Name Components
Surname :
Bailey
Forename :
Alfred Marshall
Date :
1894-1978
eng
Latn
authorizedForm
rda
Bailey, A. M. , 1894-1978
Name Components
Surname :
Bailey
Forename :
A. M.
Date :
1894-1978
eng
Latn
alternativeForm
aacr2
Bailey, Fred, 1895-1972
Name Components
Surname :
Bailey
Forename :
Fred
Date :
1895-1972
eng
Latn
alternativeForm
rda
Genders
Exist Dates
Biographical History
Alfred M. Bailey was the second director of the Denver Museum of Natural History (now the Denver Museum of Nature & Science), serving from 1936 to his retirement in 1969. During this time, the museum achieved world recognition as a leading natural history museum with extensive collections and stunning displays of wildlife from around the world. Bailey was born in 1894 in Iowa City, Iowa. He studied museum methods at the University of Iowa, where he expanded his interests to include taxidermy and photography. While an undergraduate, he participated in one of the university's expeditions studying the unique ecology of the northwestern Hawaiian island of Laysan.
After receiving his degree in 1916, Bailey was curator of birds and mammals for the Louisiana State Museum in New Orleans until 1919. In 1917 he married Muriel Eggenberg in Iowa City. In 1919 the Baileys moved to Juneau, Alaska, where Bailey was the first representative of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in southeastern Alaska. During this time, the Denver Museum convinced him to come to work for it and to collect specimens for its planned Arctic collections. In 1921 he became Curator of Birds and Mammals, and he continued fieldwork in the Arctic. In 1926 Bailey moved to the Field Museum in Chicago where he participated in an expedition to Abyssinia (present-day Ethiopia). He then served as director of the Chicago Academy of Sciences from 1927 until 1936, when he returned to the Denver Museum as director. Bailey believed that fieldwork was the lifeblood of a natural history museum. Accordingly, he enlisted interest and financial support for many museum expeditions and collecting trips around the world. He traveled to Australia, New Zealand, Alaska, Labrador, Ecuador, the Galapagos Islands and Botswana, personally making motion pictures to record these adventures.
An excellent fundraiser, Bailey directed modernization of the museum and four major building additions that housed growing collections. The Museum gained international recognition for its accurately detailed wildlife dioramas and special exhibits. Bailey received numerous awards and an honorary doctorate for his work in natural history and leadership at the museum. One great personal contribution was in ornithology. He wrote for National Geographic and other popular magazines and had numerous works published in books and important scientific journals. His most recognized work is Birds of Colorado, co-authored by Robert J. Niedrach and published in 1965 by the Museum. Other publications include Birds of Arctic Alaska, published in 1948, The Red Crossbills of Colorado, published in 1953, and Field Work of a Museum Naturalist, Alaska, published in 1971, all by the DMNH and available at DMNS' Bailey Library.
In 1969, after 33 years as director, Bailey stepped down and accepted the title Director Emeritus. He continued to come to the museum and concentrated on writing about his observations from a field journal that he had kept consistently from the time of his first expedition in 1912. He died in 1978.
eng
Latn
External Related CPF
https://viaf.org/viaf/91241356
https://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q4723122
https://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n90706087
https://id.loc.gov/authorities/n90706087
https://catalog.archives.gov/id/18546068
https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/L5YH-F8B
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Languages Used
eng
Latn
Subjects
Authors, American
Birds
Botany
Chilkat Indians
Haida Indians
Museum curators
Natural history museum directors
Ornithology
Yupik Eskimos
Zoology
Nationalities
Americans
Activities
Occupations
Ornithologists
Photographers
Legal Statuses
Places
Alaska
AssociatedPlace
Iowa
AssociatedPlace
Arctic regions
AssociatedPlace
Colorado
AssociatedPlace
Colorado
AssociatedPlace
Convention Declarations
<conventionDeclaration><citation>VIAF</citation></conventionDeclaration>