Zipporah J. Jenness

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 Zipporah J. Jenness and her birds

[All taken in Hampton.]

This brings us to the mention of taxidermists, of whom there are two in
Hampton, besides Mr. Blake -- Mrs. Abbot B. (Zipporah J.) Jenness and
S.Albert Shaw. So far as can be learned, no others have ever practiced the
art here to any extent.

The beautiful plumage first attracted the little girl, Zipporah J. Shaw.
Her brother used to shoot blue-jays in the corn-field and sometimes save
the feathers; and she would beg him to let her have a bird to stuff. At
last, he gave her a little bluebird and showed her how to skin it. She
succeeded so well, he soon let her have all she wanted and often shot
birds for her. Then people began to bring her work., She studied books on
taxidermy, and practiced the lessons so well, she has long since become a
famous taxidermist in all these parts, and without advertising, has an
average annual patronage of a hundred birds, stuffed and mounted by her
own hands in spring and fall, work extending into the winter for owls. Of
these Mrs. Jenness stuffed thirty-four in the winter of 1889-90, sixteen
of them being arctic owls, shot in Hampton.

Mr. S. Albert Shaw, her kinsman, stuffed a few birds as early as 1878,
and began to make his collection two years later. With him, it is not a trade,
but, as he says, a hobby. Mr. Shaw is a farmer, working early and late in
the fields; and since 1880 he has made a study of the habits and
migrations of birds and kept a record of his observations. In nesting time
and again in the fall he takes daily walks in the woods, with spy-glass,
note-book and pencil, often returning enriched by some new discovery. He
is an occasional contributor to the columns of the Ornithologist and
Oologist, a monthly magazine always to be found on his table. Mr. Shaw has
a collection, all taken, stuffed and mounted by himself, of 335 birds
representing 190 of the 202 species known to occur in Hampton. Oology
follows naturally; and he has eggs of fifty-nine of the sixty-seven birds
known to breed in Hampton. Egg of six other summer residents may possibly
be found hereafter. Some of those taken are very rare, notably, those of
the Nashville warbler, seldom found in New England, in the migration of
that bird to the farther north.

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Cronologia Ornitologica