Happy birthday to noted ornithologist and identity-theft victim James Bond, who was born on this day 125  years ago today.

Bond was born at 1821 Pine Street, a four-story brick building that's still standing. It is now apartments.

Here's a bit more background, from my book:

Unlike a certain spy of the same name, went by “Jimmy” or “Jim” his entire life. 

The Twentieth Century would be known as the American Century, shaped by two cataclysmic wars and incredible technological advances -- from automobiles and airplanes to high-powered computers and a ubiquitous Internet -- and Bond would live through nine decades of it.

  The Bond family fortune was enormous, but for the youngster, it was ultimately far less significant than its location, Philadelphia, a city long known as the cradle of American ornithology. 

Thanks to such pioneer ornithologists as author-illustrator Alexander Wilson, the legendary John James Audubon, author John Cassin, and Academy of Natural Sciences founding member Thomas Say, Bond grew up in an environment where birds and natural history were revered.

 Jim Bond was born into a long line of U.S. Bonds that dates from as early as the 1600s.  His ancestors are said to include Thomas and Phineas Bond, who were among the founders of the American Philosophical Society, the University of Pennsylvania, and Pennsylvania Hospital.

On Tuesday evening, my Screech Owl Companion co-author Scott Weston were guests on "Bird Calls," an NPR program out of Shreveport. Host Cliff Shackelford, Scott, and I could see one another on Zoom while we chatted.

Above is a shot I grabbed with my iPhone while we were waiting for Scott to log in. That's Kiara Lafitte of the great "Bird Calls" tech team in the foreground on the left, me on the right, and Cliff -- a real screech owl aficionado and inventor of the Owl Shack nestbox -- below with the earphones.

I discuss The Real James Bond toward the end of the show.

You can  hear the show  by going here:

https://www.redriverradio.org/show/bird-calls/2024-08-12/bird-calls-orange-crowned-warbler

and then clicking

The segment with Scott and me starts at 6:30... If you look across the top, you can see where you can slide the tab and fast-forward through the opening (which is about birds mating for life -- or not -- and Orange Crowned Warblers:

Next time you’re in Washington, D.C., check out the James Bond exhibit at the Interational  Spy Museum.

I’m told my book is for sale there, so the exhibit just has to be terrific .

More on the exhibit here:

https://www.spymuseum.org/bond-in-motion/

I happened upon a post on the Collider website inspired by my story about Bond in the Smithsonian Magazine a few years back.

Sadly, the writer Emmanuel Ronquillo wrote all about the article but failed to mention my biography of Bond for Schiffer Books, which has even cooler intel on the real Bond. (Emmanuel, there's still time!)

I have to say that Collider did a very clever riff on my book's cover image (above).

You can read the post here:

https://collider.com/james-bond-name-origin/

Today (October 5) is Global James Bond Day, so dedicated because today is the anniversary of the first Bond movie's release in 1962.

In James Bond's honor, I present... the real James Bond's licenses to kill. 

The real Bond had far more of them than 007 since he needed to collect birds on so many Caribbean islands for so many years.

The Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia has quite a few in its archives, even if the rarest one -- signed by Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo -- never made it to their collection.

I did a ton of research in the Mary and James Bond archives while writing the book. The Free Library is a terrific place.

You should take a free tour of the Rare Book Department next time you are in town.

More here:

https://libwww.freelibrary.org/programs/rarebooks/

The latest edition of Bob Dolgan's This Week in Birding features an interview I did about The Real James Bond.

You can get a free subscription (and read the interview) here:

https://www.twibchicago.com/

The market for early editions of Birds of the West Indies continues to be quite bullish.

A friend recently pointed out a couple of first editions of James Bond's seminal 1936 Birds of the West Indies are for sale. The price has certainly gone up since its debut, when it sold for $4.50.

Here's one for $16,000.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/334539080202?hash=item4de415420a%3Ag%3ABioAAOSwMpdkh2Ju&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=711-53200-19255-0&campid=5338304675&customid=&toolid=10049

Here's another for $12,500.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/385678296079?hash=item59cc37c40f%3Ag%3A4DEAAOSwbW9kh2H%7E&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=711-53200-19255-0&campid=5338304675&customid=&toolid=10049

Neither had a dust jacket, which is a nice feature to have when you're shelling out that kind of dough, but the main selling point is that they are signed first editions.

A couple of years ago, I could have bought one for $4,000, but I thought that was a bit steep. Wrong.

I also found an unsigned 1947 edition on eBay, incorrectly billed as  Field Guide of Birds in the West Indies. The blurb for the book states that this was the edition of the book that Fleming used to swipe Bond's name from the cover, but that is most likely incorrect. 

While researching The Real James Bond, I came across an interview with Bond in which he said that when he visited Fleming at Goldeneye, Fleming showed him the 1936 edition.

The 1947 edition is still a great book, and the first edition that was streamlined enough to be useful in the field.

A few British sellers were offering the same copy for $1,900.

No mention of a dustjacket for that copy either.

https://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl&st=sl&ref=bf_s2_a6_t1_27&qi=HyM9QfKfbe6C5rrPCs184yYv0Gc_1695644148_1:5:27&bq=author%3Dfleming%252C%2520ian%2520%2D%2520bond%252C%2520james%26title%3Dfield%2520guide%2520of%2520birds%2520in%2520the%2520west%2520indies

A while back, I noticed that the logo for Ian Fleming Publications was not a pistol as one might expect, but a hummingbird. And not just any hummingbird, mind you, but a Red-billed Streamertail.

I asked the publisher if she would be interested in an article about the bird behind the logo, and she immediately agreed.

The article features photos I took of the bird while in Jamaica, a photo by Ricardo Miller (one of Jamaica's top birders), plus other hummingbird shots and a photo of Goldeneye, now a luxury resort.

You can read the article here: