This week we are diving into the realm of popular natural history with the American Boys Book of Bugs, Butterflies and Beetles by Dan Beard; with illustrations by the author. It was published by the J. B. Lippincott Company in Philadelphia in 1915. The colored plate features insects from the American Museum of Natural History. Daniel Carter Beard was the founder of the Sons of Daniel Boone youth program that later merged with the Boy Scouts of America in 1910. This book is a guide to insects with tips for catching, collecting, and preserving specimens. It is specifically targeted at boys, but it follows in a long tradition of teaching young people about the natural world because it was considered a wholesome pastime activity.
Beard wrote in the introduction:
“Among the little folk of this world known as the insects, we find almost as many traits of character as we do among the human beings. We have the idle insects, the industrious insects, the warlike insects, the robber insects, the dead-beat insects, the stupid insects and the intelligent insects. We also have among them the low, degraded insects, dirty insects, clean insects, the sluggish slow-moving insects, the bright lively insects, the useful insects and the beautiful insects; all of them interesting, all of them in one way or another are of vast importance to man, and a study of their habits is not only a source of fun but it is also a most useful study. Besides which, boys, nature lovers live longer and happier lives than ordinary people!”
Today’s post features examples of Lepidoptera, the order of insects that includes butterflies and moths.
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View other posts about BUGS.
–Sarah, Special Collections Graduate Intern
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