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Taking Flight: A History of Birds and People in the Heart of America
A dynamic account of ornithological history in America’s heartland.
Today, more than fifty million Americans traipse through wetlands at dawn, endure clouds of mosquitoes, and brave freezing autumn winds just to catch a glimpse of a bird. The human desire to connect with winged creatures defies age and generation. In the Midwest, humans and birds have lived together for more than twelve thousand years. Taking Flight explores how and why people have worshipped, feared, studied, hunted, eaten, and protected the birds that surrounded them.
Author and birder Michael Edmonds has combed archaeological reports, missionaries’ journals, travelers’ letters, early scientific treatises, the memoirs of American Indian elders, and the folklore of hunters, farmers, and formerly enslaved people throughout the Midwest to reveal how our ancestors thought about the very same birds we see today. Whether you’re a casual bird-watcher, a hard-core life-lister, or simply someone who loves the outdoors, you’ll look at birds differently after reading this book.
Today, more than fifty million Americans traipse through wetlands at dawn, endure clouds of mosquitoes, and brave freezing autumn winds just to catch a glimpse of a bird. The human desire to connect with winged creatures defies age and generation. In the Midwest, humans and birds have lived together for more than twelve thousand years. Taking Flight explores how and why people have worshipped, feared, studied, hunted, eaten, and protected the birds that surrounded them.
Author and birder Michael Edmonds has combed archaeological reports, missionaries’ journals, travelers’ letters, early scientific treatises, the memoirs of American Indian elders, and the folklore of hunters, farmers, and formerly enslaved people throughout the Midwest to reveal how our ancestors thought about the very same birds we see today. Whether you’re a casual bird-watcher, a hard-core life-lister, or simply someone who loves the outdoors, you’ll look at birds differently after reading this book.
- GenresNatureHistoryNonfiction
224 pages, Paperback
Published February 6, 2018
6 people are currently reading
52 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
March 11, 2025
I've read many dozens of books about birds (and birding), but never one like this.
TAKING FLIGHT considers areas I've read about in all those other books, here and there, but what's beautiful is how the author ties them all together so wonderfully, with this thread stretching from literally thousands of years ago to our present time. Just a brilliant combination of research, writing, and thought. Highest recommendation for lovers of birds and cultural history.
TAKING FLIGHT considers areas I've read about in all those other books, here and there, but what's beautiful is how the author ties them all together so wonderfully, with this thread stretching from literally thousands of years ago to our present time. Just a brilliant combination of research, writing, and thought. Highest recommendation for lovers of birds and cultural history.
September 3, 2018
I have always had a fondness for birds, and Edmonds' story of their intricate relationship with humans is beautifully written. I grew up in a household that knew about the prehistoric native peoples of Ohio, and we had a Bird Stone that sat on my Dad's desk. I was fascinated by its beauty.
Take time to read this one.
Take time to read this one.
July 31, 2019
Books dealing with nature are often studies of the animals or plants themselves. “Taking Flight” is a study of the interaction between birds and people over millennia in the central United States.
The first chapter provides an overview of what is to come. The second moves on to prehistory, those early inhabitants whose only records are found in the bones they left in their trash heaps, their earthen mounds, their carvings and the paintings on their cave walls. From these we can guess at what they ate, the birds they lived among and the parts they played in the Indians’ lives. Chapter three focuses on the lives, traditions and societies of the Indians who gathered in cities such as Cahokia within a few centuries of 1,000 B. C. Their surviving mounds and artifacts provide a clearer insight into the role birds played in their civilizations.
Chapter four advances into the societies that left no written record but whose pottery and accounts of the Europeans who met them enable us to better understand their appreciation of birds. Chapter five is the age of missionaries and explorers who interpreted birds through their religious and economic lens. Chapter six introduces the soldiers, statemen and scientists who studied and exploited avian populations. One of my favorite chapters is seven, the tales of the early ornithologists, think John James Audubon, who killed birds, yes, but left us drawings and accounts that leave us in awe today. Chapter eight studies the names the various cultures attributed to birds. In chapter nine the author entertains us with the humor and superstitions of the region. You know that the large part of a wishbone brings good luck but did you know the same results from having a cardinal cross your path? For sure! Chapter ten takes a sad turn as we read of the insatiable desire for meat and feathers and improved killing techniques turned the native attitude of taking what you need into the American desire to take all you could get and sell, leading to mass exterminations. Chapter eleven closes the book with reflections on how the author, and many bird lovers, experience our feathered friends whose songs we enjoy as they soar overhead.
Author Michael Edmonds has crafted a work that blends history with nature. It captures our imagination as we contemplate the place of birds in ancient lore and religions. It saddens us to realize how diminished the bird populations have become in recent centuries. Thankfully, he gives us something to ponder as we gaze upon the birds in our own days.
I did receive a free copy of this book without an obligation to post a review.
The first chapter provides an overview of what is to come. The second moves on to prehistory, those early inhabitants whose only records are found in the bones they left in their trash heaps, their earthen mounds, their carvings and the paintings on their cave walls. From these we can guess at what they ate, the birds they lived among and the parts they played in the Indians’ lives. Chapter three focuses on the lives, traditions and societies of the Indians who gathered in cities such as Cahokia within a few centuries of 1,000 B. C. Their surviving mounds and artifacts provide a clearer insight into the role birds played in their civilizations.
Chapter four advances into the societies that left no written record but whose pottery and accounts of the Europeans who met them enable us to better understand their appreciation of birds. Chapter five is the age of missionaries and explorers who interpreted birds through their religious and economic lens. Chapter six introduces the soldiers, statemen and scientists who studied and exploited avian populations. One of my favorite chapters is seven, the tales of the early ornithologists, think John James Audubon, who killed birds, yes, but left us drawings and accounts that leave us in awe today. Chapter eight studies the names the various cultures attributed to birds. In chapter nine the author entertains us with the humor and superstitions of the region. You know that the large part of a wishbone brings good luck but did you know the same results from having a cardinal cross your path? For sure! Chapter ten takes a sad turn as we read of the insatiable desire for meat and feathers and improved killing techniques turned the native attitude of taking what you need into the American desire to take all you could get and sell, leading to mass exterminations. Chapter eleven closes the book with reflections on how the author, and many bird lovers, experience our feathered friends whose songs we enjoy as they soar overhead.
Author Michael Edmonds has crafted a work that blends history with nature. It captures our imagination as we contemplate the place of birds in ancient lore and religions. It saddens us to realize how diminished the bird populations have become in recent centuries. Thankfully, he gives us something to ponder as we gaze upon the birds in our own days.
I did receive a free copy of this book without an obligation to post a review.
June 20, 2018
This was a great book! I was lucky enough to hear the author give a short presentation about the book yesterday and recommend both the book and his presentation if you ever have a chance to hear him. Now I want to visit Hopewell in Ohio and Cahokia in Illinois, and the many effigy mounds in Wisconsin. I learned much about native American spiritual practices and beliefs, and also the role of folklore in understanding how humans related to birds. The illustrations -- and there are plenty --enhance the text.
November 5, 2018
I bought this book after I saw the author give a talk on this topic and I was very glad I did. A thoroughly researched, richly illustrated tome that will be of interest to anyone in the Midwest with an appreciation of birds or history.
August 17, 2018
Most of the birds we know today evolved from the dinosaurs of sixty-five million years ago. We, the homo sapiens among us, evolved two hundred thousand years ago. Then twelve thousand years ago, humans moved south from Alaska to new habitats created by the retreating glaciers. And that’s when our story takes off. This interesting book describes the changing ways that people thought about and acted toward birds.
For the early people, birds became powerful symbols as mediators between the upper and lower worlds. Raptors soared into the upper world while loons and ducks vanished to the lower world.
Thirteen hundred years ago, effigy mounds began to appear in the region with many of them taking the shape of birds.
In the modern era, John J Audubon painted and documented life-size birds for twenty-five years, filling the largest book ever published up to that time two hundred years ago.
Later, Thure Kumlien, from Sweden, and his young wife walked seventy miles from a young Milwaukee to build a log cabin in Jefferson County in oak woods on Lake Koshkonong. He was no good at farming but good at birding. Wisconsin hired him to create bird collections for the university. Then he worked at the Milwaukee Public Museum classifying, labeling and mounting birds. Four thousand people a day came to view his exhibit. Carl Akeley, among his proteges, went on to the Field Museum in Chicago and New York’s Museum of Natural History.
Peterson field guides appeared in the mid-thirties, which gave amateurs and professionals a common language for each of the birds, moving beyond the local, regional and colloquial terms in use before then.
For twelve thousand years, humans and birds lived harmoniously in mid-America. The ancient balance remained steady until the nineteenth century, writes Michael Edmonds. Then, in a human lifetime, railroads, shotguns, immigration and urbanization converged, sending hunters into the Midwest meadows.
The New York Zoological Society collected surveys from around the country, concluding that half of American’s birds disappeared in fifteen years since the eighteen eighties. A Milwaukee respondent to the survey wrote that a quarter of songbirds remain with smaller proportions of other birds. The onslaught ended around the turn of the twentieth century after teachers and environmental organizations taught children about conservation.
This book project unfolded over twenty-five years. A sixty-four page appendix supports the book. I found some of the first-person writing and anecdotes unusual for a science history book of this caliber.
Interesting book about birds and people in the woodlands, meadows and prairies in the Midwest. But as a city dweller, I also would have enjoyed learning about urban birds and their habitats.
I live on the Milwaukee River, a flyway for geese and a habitat for many birds, including woodpeckers.
Meanwhile, I work on the twelfth floor of a good hundred-year-old building in downtown Milwaukee, near Lake Michigan. Seagulls soar and glide among the buildings. Every now and then one will land on our windowsills, cocking their heads to figure out who we are and what we do. Meanwhile, we wave and say hello, mimicking the birds, which get bored rather than frightened.
Maybe another new book will satisfy my curiosity about urban birds and wildlife. Darwin Comes to Town: How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution.
For the early people, birds became powerful symbols as mediators between the upper and lower worlds. Raptors soared into the upper world while loons and ducks vanished to the lower world.
Thirteen hundred years ago, effigy mounds began to appear in the region with many of them taking the shape of birds.
In the modern era, John J Audubon painted and documented life-size birds for twenty-five years, filling the largest book ever published up to that time two hundred years ago.
Later, Thure Kumlien, from Sweden, and his young wife walked seventy miles from a young Milwaukee to build a log cabin in Jefferson County in oak woods on Lake Koshkonong. He was no good at farming but good at birding. Wisconsin hired him to create bird collections for the university. Then he worked at the Milwaukee Public Museum classifying, labeling and mounting birds. Four thousand people a day came to view his exhibit. Carl Akeley, among his proteges, went on to the Field Museum in Chicago and New York’s Museum of Natural History.
Peterson field guides appeared in the mid-thirties, which gave amateurs and professionals a common language for each of the birds, moving beyond the local, regional and colloquial terms in use before then.
For twelve thousand years, humans and birds lived harmoniously in mid-America. The ancient balance remained steady until the nineteenth century, writes Michael Edmonds. Then, in a human lifetime, railroads, shotguns, immigration and urbanization converged, sending hunters into the Midwest meadows.
The New York Zoological Society collected surveys from around the country, concluding that half of American’s birds disappeared in fifteen years since the eighteen eighties. A Milwaukee respondent to the survey wrote that a quarter of songbirds remain with smaller proportions of other birds. The onslaught ended around the turn of the twentieth century after teachers and environmental organizations taught children about conservation.
This book project unfolded over twenty-five years. A sixty-four page appendix supports the book. I found some of the first-person writing and anecdotes unusual for a science history book of this caliber.
Interesting book about birds and people in the woodlands, meadows and prairies in the Midwest. But as a city dweller, I also would have enjoyed learning about urban birds and their habitats.
I live on the Milwaukee River, a flyway for geese and a habitat for many birds, including woodpeckers.
Meanwhile, I work on the twelfth floor of a good hundred-year-old building in downtown Milwaukee, near Lake Michigan. Seagulls soar and glide among the buildings. Every now and then one will land on our windowsills, cocking their heads to figure out who we are and what we do. Meanwhile, we wave and say hello, mimicking the birds, which get bored rather than frightened.
Maybe another new book will satisfy my curiosity about urban birds and wildlife. Darwin Comes to Town: How the Urban Jungle Drives Evolution.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews