1. William Bartram was an American naturalist, writer and explorer.
26 Facts About William Bartram
1. 2.
William Bartram has been described as "the first naturalist who penetrated the dense tropical forests of Florida".
3.
William Bartram was one of the first ornithologists born in America.
4.
The son of Ann and the naturalist John Bartram, William and his twin sister Elizabeth were born in Kingsessing, Philadelphia, in the Province of Pennsylvania.
5.
From his mid-teens, William Bartram was noted for the quality of his botanic and ornithological drawings.
6.
William Bartram had an increasing role in the maintenance of his father's botanic garden, and added many rare species to it.
7.
William Bartram first visited some rice plantations in Midway then traveled on to Darien where he was the guest of Lachlan McIntosh.
8.
In Travels, William Bartram related an incident at this point that most probably took place in 1776.
9.
John and William Bartram had discovered two new trees there in 1765, but they had no flowers for the season was late.
10.
William Bartram described these trees in Travels, the Franklin tree and fevertree.
11.
William Bartram joined the survey party as it marked the boundary.
12.
William Bartram crossed the mouth of the St Marys River and landed on the north end of Amelia Island, then crossing Egan's creek he traveled to Lord Egmont's plantation, near where the town of Fernandina would later arise.
13.
In three days William Bartram landed at the plantation of Francis Philip Fatio at Switzerland.
14.
William Bartram paused the next day at Fort Picolata where he had failed as a planter seven years earlier.
15.
William Bartram then kept to the west bank, or Indian shore, the river being the division between Indian country on the west bank and English land on the east.
16.
William Bartram observed a Seminole village on the bluff where Palatka now stands and where he was invited to a watermelon feast that summer.
17.
Just south of Palatka, at Stokes Landing, James Spalding built his Lower Store where William Bartram made his headquarters while in Florida.
18.
One day while working at his desk William Bartram heard a disturbance in the adjacent Indian camp.
19.
Some most memorable events in Travels occurred during this trip upriver when a wolf stole his fish as William Bartram slept, he was jostled and threatened by alligators while fishing from his boat, and he was witness to a territorial battle between two of the monsters.
20.
William Bartram's plaited tail brandished high floats upon the lake.
21.
William Bartram's writing influenced many of the Romantic writers of the day.
22.
William Bartram tutored nieces and nephews, penned a number of essays, contributed to several works anonymously, and helped run the family horticultural business.
23.
In 1802, William Bartram met the school teacher Alexander Wilson and began to teach him the rudiments of ornithology and natural history illustration.
24.
William Bartram maintained a "Diary" that records bird migrations, plant life, and the weather.
25.
William Bartram refused a request to teach botany at the University of Pennsylvania, and in his sixties, declined an invitation from President Thomas Jefferson to accompany an expedition up the Red River in the Louisiana Territory, in 1806.
26.
William Bartram died at his home in 1823, at the age of 84.