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Psalm
#104 [From a verse on Coe's faculty in the 1905 Rabbit]
Bailey and Doc. Are other cognomens;
I name him from the warblers he so loves.
Robin and nightingale and thrush and wren,
Ducks, geese, aye, even turkey cocks and
hens
Yield to his trusty fangs.
During
the first three decades of Coe's existence, it had on the faculty three
skilled biologists of national stature. Professor Frederick
Starr, professor of biological sciences and geology, was at Coe for
three years (1884-87). In addition to his teaching duties, he
gave nature talks, led field excursions with the Agassiz Club, and was
a leader of boys' work in the YMCA. He later became a student of pigmy
tribes in Central Africa and head of anthropology at the University of
Chicago He translated a book dealing with pigmy tribes in Central
Africa and wrote several books in anthropology, including his
Indians of Southern Mexico, one of three books by Starr still
available in Coe's library.
Starr was succeeded by Seth Meek, a professor of natural sciences at
Coe from 1887 to 1892. In 1889 he became the curator of the
college's museum and he also served as the college's librarian for one
year (during a period when Coe had seven librarians in eight
years). Meek's specialty was ichthyology. He left Coe in
1892 to become curator of the Chicago Museum of Natural History.
The third biologist in this triumvirate was Bert H. Bailey, the son of
a Presbyterian minister, who came to Cedar Rapids with his parents when
he was twelve years old. Bailey soon became a student in the Coe
Academy, where he developed a life-long friendship with Professors Meek
and C. O. Bates, head of the chemistry department. As S. W.
Stookey, a fellow faculty member, later recalled, Bailey from an early
age had the "habit of wandering the woods ... sometimes to the
detriment of the interests of Latin and Greek, but with ever increasing
promise for his future as a naturalist." As a young man, Bailey
enjoyed going on field trips with hunters, providing him with an
insights into nature and birds not otherwise available. He also
had the good fortune to meet a man who taught him how to do taxidermy,
an art which he "assiduously cultivated" for the rest of his life.
After graduating from Coe in 1897, Bailey spent three years at Rush
Medical College, where many Coe grads of the era received their medical
education. He intended to become a medical missionary. But
the discovery of heart problems convinced him that he could not survive
the physical challenges of the missionary field. In the fall of
1900, the 25-year-old Bailey returned to his alma mater as chair of the
zoology department. It was in this same year that he married Anna
Condit.
Although Bailey was only at Coe for 17 years, prematurely dying in June
of 1917, he was one of the most productive faculty in the history of
the college. As the curator of the museum, he dramatically
increased the size of its scientific collection. In 1905 he
traveled to British Honduras and, according to Stookey, returned with
"the third largest collection of birds from that region in this
country." In addition to birds that he mounted, Coe alumni and
associates sent him specimens from all over the world. From a
small collection in Old Main, the collection eventually expanded to
house over 2,000 birds, plants, fossils, minerals, and rocks on the
third floor of Carnegie Science. It was probably the second
largest museum of natural history in the state, surpassed only by the
museum at the University of Iowa.
As might be expected, Bailey was a strong advocate for protection of
natural resources. His thorough familiarity with bird life and
natural lore in Eastern Iowa enabled him to understand how many wild
birds and animals were disappearing from the state. His
conservation work included appeals to the state legislature for
protection of birds, and he vigorously lobbied for a closed season to
prohibit the hunting of quail.
In the year prior to his death, Bailey was granted a one-year's leave
of absence from Coe so he could complete his doctorate at the
University of Iowa. His research involved collecting data to
produce a complete catalog of small mammals in Iowa. Although
Bailey's illness kept him from presenting a final draft of his thesis
for the degree, the Iowa Geological Survey did posthumously publish his
Raptorial Birds of Iowa in 1918. Several
years before, a local firm had published Bailey's Two Hundred Wild
Birds of Iowa, a guide for helping young people learn how to
identify birds in the field.
It is evident from the many references to Bailey in the Cosmos
and Acorn that students felt a deep admiration for Bailey as
instructor and human being. The editors of the 1909 Rabbit
dedicated the yearbook to Prof. Bailey. They note his many
contributions to the student body, including his service as a team
doctor for student athletes.
We
know no kindlier friend, no wiser counselor, no more willing helper to
every high achievement than he is. No more genial and cheery
greetings are given by anyone. Full of humor, and loving a good
joke and a hearty laugh, he never fails to be considerate of the finest
feelings and sensitive natures.
At
Bailey's funeral, E. R. Burkhalter, long-time member of Coe's Board of
Trustees and Bailey's first pastor at the First Presbyterian Church,
recalled similar qualities in his portrait of Bailey's "religious view
of life":
He
has been truly described as a scientist, and such indeed he was but he
was a scientist in a constant attitude of worship. And there was
about him that sense of awe, of mystery, of wonder, which always
characterizes the religious spirit and denotes a great soul. But
at the same time religion was to him not only worship and mystery and
reverence, it was also goodness, kindness, love. And it was
practical helpful goodness, it was service. His conception of
life led him to be good and to do good.
It was during this same service that President Marquis recollected how
Bailey would have students in his ornithology class rise before dawn
and go into the woods so that they might "see the birds and the natural
life of the forest as the sun was coming up." Following their
investigation of the natural world, Bailey and his class would return
to campus and he would read to them Psalm #104, giving the text "a
meaning and a quiet emphasis that were all his own": "O Lord, how
manifold are they works! In wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth
is full of thy riches." (Psalm 104:24)
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