The Concord Museum is collaborating with Mass Audubon to present a special exhibition, Alive with Birds: William Brewster in Concord, open March 4, 2022. William Brewster (1851-1919) was Mass Audubon’s first President. He dedicated over thirty years of his life to the study of birds in Concord at his property, which he called October Farm. Drawn to Concord for its natural beauty and abundant bird life, Brewster made October Farm into an experimental field laboratory and documented its wildlife for scientific study and public enlightenment. His rich observations and analysis of the local landscape included a concern for environmental changes caused by humans. Brewster was one of the country’s earliest advocates for the protection of birds and the conservation of their habitats. In 2019, Mass Audubon received a 143-acre parcel of land which was once part of October Farm, which has been renamed Brewster’s Woods Wildlife Sanctuary.

 

This exhibition explores William Brewster’s life and legacy in Concord, featuring paintings and sculpture from the Museum of American Bird Art and ornithological artifacts from the Concord Museum, Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology, and the Chesterwood Archives at Williams College.

 

 Image: Louis Agassiz Fuertes (1874-1927), Bird Chart Number Four, 1916, Watercolor on paper, Mass Audubon Collection, 1916