New York Zoological Society. Department of Tropical Research expedition illustrations and related visual materials

Between 1916 and 1964, the New York Zoological Society’s Department of Tropical Research (DTR), led by William Beebe (1877-1962), conducted dozens of pioneering ecological expeditions across tropical terrestrial and marine locales. For general information on the DTR’s history, see the Historical Note for WCS Archives Collection 1005A.

Central to its profound influence with both popular and technical audiences was the DTR’s use of art as a tool for exploring and documenting ecology. Within the DTR, artists were not simply decorators of the scientists’ writings; instead, they were essential communicators of information about ecological relationships. DTR staff artists produced over 3,300 illustrations—nearly 2,000 of which are present in this collection—ranging from depictions of single specimens to complex narrative images that show where and how animals lived. At a time when photography could not adequately capture movement and morphological details, DTR artists constructed visualizations of natural environments that had been difficult or impossible to access, let alone record.

DTR artists often worked from collected specimens, painstakingly illustrating the minutiae of shape, color, and patterning. They also worked out in the field, perching among tropical forests with their drawing paper in their laps or donning diving helmets and strapping zinc tablets to their swimsuits in order to draw underwater. In some cases, DTR artists had to rely on Beebe’s verbal descriptions and notes to visually reconstruct environments and animals. During the Bathysphere descents in the 1930s, for instance, Beebe spent his time in the sphere describing as much as he could into the telephone transmitter that ran to the ship above him, where DTR researcher Gloria Hollister transcribed Beebe’s dictation; in turn, DTR artist Else Bostelmann relied on these notes as well as additional description from Beebe to create illustrations of deep-sea creatures she had not observed herself.

During its nearly fifty-year existence, the DTR employed over a dozen artists. They include Toshio Asaeda, Harriet Bennett, Else Bostelmann, Douglas Boyden, Gilbert Broking, John Cody, Isabel Cooper, Donald Dickerman, Julie C. Emsley, Dwight Franklin, Frances Waite Gibson, E. J. Geske, Ken Gosner, Rachel Hartley, Llewellyn Miller, Laura Schlageter, George Swanson, Anna Taylor, and Helen Damrosch Tee-Van. (The majority of these artists are represented in this collection; see the Series 1 Scope and Content notes for more on this.)

Dozens of the illustrations were used in technical publications, but they reached a wider audience through their inclusion in popular publications, including articles in National Geographic, the Bulletin of the New York Zoological Society (and its successor, Animal Kingdom), and the New York Times, as well as many of Beebe’s bestselling books. In fact, Beebe and the DTR made extraordinary efforts to reach audiences beyond the scientific academy. In addition to publishing popular articles and books, they wowed audiences across the country with depictions of their jungle research and marine encounters in live lectures and exhibitions at such venues as the Bronx Zoo and the American Museum of Natural History. In these popular forms, from articles to exhibitions, the illustrations were central to shaping viewers' understandings of tropical regions and the wildlife that inhabit them.