Turn, turn, turn the page on a classic book

IN THE SPRING of 1824, John James Audubon arrived in Philadelphia. He came from New Orleans in search of a publisher for his illustrations of America's birds. The artist found fans in the city, but no engraver willing to undertake the project. Audubon had also been nominated for membership in the Academy of Natural Sciences, the nation's pre-eminent scientific body of the time. He was rejected.

What a difference 183 years make.

Audubon eventually found a publisher in Europe, and the drawings he brought to Philadelphia were collected as The Birds of America. These images are now among the most famous and valuable works of American art. Today, The Birds of America, bound in five volumes, occupies a prominent place in the academy's library as one of fewer than 120 intact editions that remain from the original 200 Audubon made.

One volume lies open in a locked glass case whose temperature and humidity are monitored around the clock. In July, the institution began a daily page-turning ceremony, revealing another of Audubon's 435 classic works every weekday at 3:15 p.m.

The ceremony is one of the few opportunities anywhere to see the breadth of Audubon's birds. A staff member from the academy dons white gloves, opens the case and carefully turns one of the giant, linen-backed pages. The wild turkey becomes the yellow-billed cuckoo, which becomes the prothonotary warbler and so on, all the way down to the Arctic water ouzel (known today as the American dipper).

The event is a daily veneration of the same man the institution once turned away. But such an acknowledgment is not unique to the academy. Over more than a century and a half, historians, scientists, birders, artists and the culture at large have elevated Audubon to almost mythic status. Among U.S. towns named for him are two in New Jersey and one in Pennsylvania. One of the country's oldest and most prominent conservation groups invokes his image.

Audubon fever took hold in the 19th century. It's as strong as ever in the 21st. "These images will still knock your socks off," said Robert Peck, the academy's curator of art and artifacts.

An artistic breakthrough

The Birds of America is impressive in scope and size: 435 prints capture 1,065 birds representing 489 species.

Audubon aspired to illustrate all American birds. More important, he wanted these illustrations to be life-size. Audubon used the largest paper available at the time: double elephant, approximately 27 inches by 39 inches.