Audubon Author

Though he is a busy New York ad- vertising man, George Dock Jr. '16 still finds time for the study of his favorite subject, birds, and for over a decade he has written the text for the famous Audubon calendars.

Dock's eager interest in birds began one day many years ago when, as a kindergartner in Ann Arbor, Mich., he found an unfamiliar bird that had been killed by striking a telephone wire. He took it to the local museum and there met Norman A. Wood, one of the great ornithologists of the turn of the century, who identified it as an Olive-backed Thrush. Wood took to the eager lad with wondering eyes, taught him taxidermy, and one fabulous day, arranged to let him spend the afternoon going through the University of Michigan's set of the Audubon Elephant Folios. The spark kindled in a young boy never died out and led to Dock's lifelong love of birdlore and to his becoming an expert on the life of Audubon. He found time for his hobby during his days at Dartmouth and even while he was flying in France with the Lafayette Escadrille during World War I.

In addition to the text for the Audubon calendars, Dock has had many articles published in various nature magazines, and in Harper's, Header'sDigest, The New Yorker, The NewYork Times Magazine, and the Encyclopedia Britannica. His work is scientific and carefully documented, yet written with keen human interest. And he has never lost the wonder and zest of an amateur in love with his subject.