April 26, 2011

Happy Birthday, John James Audubon

From Boing Boing, something different than their usual tech news: a birthday tribute to John James Audubon.

Though drawing birds had been something of an obsession, it was only a hobby until Audubon’s mill and general stores went under in the Panic of 1819, a failure his critics and many of his biographers have ascribed to a lack of ability or irresponsible distraction by his art. But nearly every business in the trans-Appalachian West failed that year, because the Western state banks and the businesses they serviced were built on paper...

(which is actually from an article in Smithsonian, linked on their site.)

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