Kathleen S. Anderson

Kathleen S. Anderson honored by Massachusetts Audubon

Wayne Petersen announced at the November 2, 2009 Club meeting that Kathleen Anderson was the recent recipient of the presitgious Massachusetts Audubon Society Allen Morgan Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Kathleen S. Anderson, Honorary Member

Wayne Petersen brought the following proposal before the Nuttall Ornithological Club Council on April 27, 2008. The council unanimously approved the resolution and bestowed the status of Honorary Member on Kathleen S. Anderson at the Club membership meeting on May 5, 2008.

As a 43-year member of the Nuttall Ornithological Club it has been my distinct pleasure to witness the coming and going of many talented and distinguished Nuttall Ornithological Club members through the years. Some of these, however, particularly stand out because of their significant contributions to ornithology, their leadership qualities or role as mentors to younger ornithologists, the recognition they have achieved from their peers, and their personal contributions to the Nuttall Club. One member that clearly manifests these characteristics and qualities is Kathleen S. Anderson.

Born on a ranch in Montana and the daughter of a U.S. Forest Service Supervisor, Kathleen soon moved to Carver, Massachusetts where early on she developed an intense interest in birds and natural history—interests that were rare among young women of her era. Her ornithological career began in earnest when she assumed a position as an ornithologist with the Department of Public Health at the Encephalitis Field Station in Lakeville, Massachusetts from 1957 to 1968. Here she learned to band birds and was actively involved in research on the relationship between mosquitoes, wild birds, and Eastern Equine Encephalitis. Following her departure from the Encephalitis Field Station, Kathleen ran an Operation Recovery bird-banding station on Duxbury Beach. This intensive project was coordinated by Chandler Robbins, James Baird, and others, and ultimately led to the establishment of the Manomet Bird Observatory (now the Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences). Kathleen was the founder of this organization, the third bird observatory ever established in North America, and its director from 1969 to 1983.

In 1973 Kathleen was a founding trustee of the Plymouth County Wildlands Trust (now the Wildlands Trust of Southeastern Massachusetts) and held the office of president until 1980. She also served on the Massachusetts Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Advisory Committee for 25 years, and currently chairs this committee. Among various other responsibilities, Kathleen has served on the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Audubon Society since 1984, as well as tenures on the board of the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, the New England Wildflower Society, the North American Loon Fund, and the American Birding Association. From 1977 to 1985 she was listed in Who's Who of American Women.

In 1974 Kathleen was the first woman ever elected to membership in the Nuttall Ornithological Club and the first female serve as President (1988 - 1989). During her years as a Club member she has variously served on the Club's Council, along with holding the offices of Secretary and Vice-president. Most recently she represented the Club in Washington as a representative to the American Bird Conservancy.

Among her many professional accolades Kathleen is an Elected Fellow of the American Ornithologists' Union, a recipient of the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology's Arthur A. Allen Award, the Lloyd Center for the Environment's George Haydock Award, and the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife's Governor Francis W. Sargent Award.

Through her many years of active service to the ornithological community, Kathleen has also found time to travel to more than a dozen countries in her pursuit of birds, along with authoring more than 50 papers in the fields of distribution, migration, banding, avian ectoparasites, arborviruses, and bird populations in a wide variety of professional and popular journals and magazines.

Given Kathleen Anderson's impressive body of work and her lifetime of dedication to ornithological research, birds, and birding, at this time I wish to propose that the Nuttall Ornithological Club recognize her outstanding contributions by electing her to Honorary Membership in the Club.

Wayne R. Petersen
April 27, 2008