In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Foreword In this compelling book, Helen Corneli salutes two of America’s most fascinating and accomplished field naturalists, Frances and Frederick Hamerstrom. It’s a heartwarming account, full of unpublished stories and insights about two people who are well known in both scientific and popular literature of the last half-century. The author, a gifted writer who knew them well, taught English at the University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point. She provides her readers with an eloquent account of the innovative and sometimes unorthodox lives of one of the twentieth century’s most remarkable couples. As a graduate student at Cornell in the late 1960s, I met raptor biologists who gathered at the Laboratory of Ornithology to study birds of prey under the direction of Dr. Tom Cade (founder of the Peregrine Fund). They told me about these pioneering ornithologists from the sand country of central Wisconsin. Fellow graduate student Jim Grier, later one of the nation’s leading authorities on eagles, introduced me to the Hamerstroms when they presented an impressive paper at Cornell about the effects of DDT on harriers and kestrels. Several decades of data comparing the ability of these DDT-sensitive raptors to breed before and after being exposed to insecticides provided some of the ammunition that led to the banning of DDT in the United States. Fran Hamerstrom also brought to Cornell her two golden eagles, conditioned by her to trust her, and presented them to Jim on captive breeding loan. Through the Grier-Hamerstrom efforts, in 1972, the first artificially inseminated golden eagles in the world were produced. xi xii As I was completing my stay at Cornell in 1971, Ron Sauey from Baraboo, Wisconsin, was beginning his graduate work at Cornell. Ron felt that his experiences with the Hamerstroms—as a volunteer research assistant one summer during his high school days—changed his life. Ron had been raised in a loving and economically privileged family. His parents were aware of his interest in nature and, although they hoped he might enter the world of commerce, they were delighted that the Hamerstroms might provide something his family could not. Living in the Hamerstrom home with its outdoor toilet, hand-pumped water, and lack of central heating, helped Ron see the world from a completely different perspective. The set of values articulated by Aldo Leopold and lived by his students, the Hamerstroms, became his inspiration to pursue a career that involved the study and conservation of birds. Soon, in 1973, Ron and I cofounded the International Crane Foundation in central Wisconsin. Ron was but one of several hundred young people whose lives were changed by their experiences with Fran and Hammy who opened their minds, their fieldwork and their home to strangers. (A potato and a plucked pigeon in a paper bag was one of their favorite Christmas gifts to friends.) It was always inspiring and entertaining to visit the Hamerstroms. You never knew what might happen in a home with a full-winged great horned owl and a refrigerator containing fresh and frozen roadkills. One friend recalls having the owl land on her head while seated at the table. Fran commanded, “Joyce, stand up very slowly. Now, sit down very quickly.” As the roosting spot dropped, the owl flew to another. On another occasion, Fran placed the jacket of her latest popular book on a volume of biochemistry. She passed the book to a visiting professor and asked how he liked her new work. It took him several minutes to realize the practical joke. Fran and Hammy waited in eager anticipation for the revelation. They loved good fun. It was a thrill for me to be able to introduce Russian raptor biologists and my close friends, Vladimir Flint and Alexander Sorokin, to the Hamerstroms. Both parties had written extensively about falconry and they bonded instantly. One evening at my home, Fran and the Russians viewed a videotape of Fran’s appearances on Late Night with David Letterman. Fran had not previously seen her performance (there was no TV in the Hamerstrom home), so both she and the Russians Foreword xiii shook with laughter every time Fran pointed and announced, “Look what she’s doing now!” She enjoyed being, and even more watching, Fran Hamerstrom. One memorable spring evening, Hammy, Fran, and I sat beside their potbellied stove, drank a little red wine, and chatted into the wee hours of the night. Then Fran led me to my unheated upstairs bedroom. The window was open and...

Share