page_title: William Beebe
section_title: The pheasant expedition
hierarchical_section_title: William Beebe / Biography / The pheasant expedition
caption_attribution_description: English: William Beebe with a long-tailed cockerel in Japan, during his expedition across Asia to document the world's pheasant species.
context_page_description: Charles William Beebe was an American naturalist, ornithologist, marine biologist, entomologist, explorer, and author. He is remembered for the numerous expeditions he conducted for the New York Zoological Society, his deep dives in the Bathysphere, and his prolific scientific writing for academic and popular audiences.
  Born in Brooklyn, New York and raised in East Orange, New Jersey, Beebe left college before obtaining a degree in order to work at the then newly opened New York Zoological Park, where he was given the duty of caring for the zoo's birds. He quickly distinguished himself in his work for the zoo, first with his skill in designing habitats for its bird population, and soon also with a series of research expeditions of increasing length, including an expedition around the world to document the world's pheasants. These expeditions formed the basis for a large quantity of writing for both popular and academic audiences, including an account of his pheasant expedition titled A Monograph of the Pheasants and published in four volumes from 1918 to 1922.
context_section_description: In December 1909, businessman and philanthropist Anthony R. Kuser proposed to the zoo that Beebe be allowed to go on a voyage around the world for the purpose of documenting the world's pheasants, which would be financed by Kuser. Hornaday strongly objected to this proposal, describing Kuser as an "evil genius" who was attempting to steal Beebe away from his duties at the zoo. However, the zoo ultimately decided in Kuser's favor, partly because the scientific papers produced by Beebe's trip to Guiana had been beneficial to the zoo's reputation. Hornaday appointed Crandall as the zoo's acting curator of birds, giving him the duty of caring for its birds in Beebe's absence. Beebe and Blair left for their expedition accompanied by Robert Bruce Horsfall, whose job would be to provide illustrations of the birds for the book that would hopefully result from this expedition.
  After crossing the Atlantic Ocean on the RMS Lusitania to London, where they gathered the supplies they would need for their expedition, Beebe and his team traveled across the Mediterranean Sea to Egypt, through the Suez Canal, and across the Indian Ocean to Ceylon, where they began their task of documenting the native wildfowl. From Ceylon they traveled to Calcutta, with the goal of capturing the species of pheasants which live only in the Himalayas. By this point Beebe was beginning to be in conflict with Horsfall, who was unaccustomed to such expeditions. After Beebe had finished his documentation in the eastern part of the range, Horsfall refused to accompany Beebe in the western part of the range, causing Beebe to leave him in the town of Jorepokhri and continue his work in the Western Himalayas without him. Horsfall rejoined them in Calcutta, from which they sailed to Indonesia. The next ship took them to Singapore, where Beebe established a base of operations for the next stage of his expedition.
  The expedition's next destination was Sarawak, on the island of Borneo. By the time they left Sarawak, the conflict between Beebe and Horsfall had grown to such a degree that Beebe decided Horsfall was endangering the expedition and must be sent home. In response to Beebe's dismissal, Horsfall retorted that he had been ill-treated by Beebe from the beginning of the expedition, and that his subsequent actions had been for the express purpose of revenge. Continuing without Horsfall, Beebe and Blair traveled to Batavia in Java, to the island of Madura just to the north, and to Belitung between Borneo and Sumatra.
  Finished in Java, Beebe and his crew sailed north from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur to begin exploring Malaya. After Malaya, the next portion of their expedition took them to Burma, where they arrived in Rangoon and traveled by rail to Myitkyina. In Burma Beebe succumbed temporarily to a bout of depression, and it was several days before he was able to resume working or continue the expedition. He attributed his recovery to the pile of penny dreadful novels he discovered in his bungalow at Pungatong, which he then read constantly for the next few days.
  The last portion of Beebe's journey took him to China, from which they made an unplanned visit to Japan in order to escape a riot as well as a surge of bubonic plague. When the plague and riots had subsided, Beebe returned to China to document the local pheasant species, then made a second visit to Japan to study pheasants kept in the Imperial Preserves there. In Japan, Beebe was given two cranes by the Imperial Household in exchange for a pair of swans, which were unknown in Japan.
  His expedition completed after a total of 17 months, Beebe and Blair crossed the Pacific to San Francisco, then crossed the United States to return to their home in New York. Their expedition had obtained live or stuffed specimens of nearly all the pheasants he had sought, and also produced extensive notes about their behavior. Some of these pheasants, such as Sclater's impeyan or Himalayan monal, had never before been seen in the wild by Americans or Europeans. Beebe's observations of sexual dimorphism in pheasants during this 
caption: William Beebe with a Japanese long-tailed fowl (red junglefowl)
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