James Bond and the Cape May Geographic Society

Chances are that one Cape May group you may not know about is the Cape May Geographic Society, a group that had an intense interest in the natural history of Cape May and in sharing history with year-round and summer residents. You may not know of Otway H. Brown, a self-taught local Cape May naturalist, the Society’s first curator, who died in 1946, shortly after the organization’s founding. Mrs. Mildred (Glen Sefton) Hiers of Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, organized a program of events for the summer of 1946 with the help of an Advisory Board of well-known scientists, many of whom had summer properties in southern Cape May County. 

The group’s mission was to serve “as a link between the vacationing public, and the many naturalists and other students who are interested in Cape May.” Ninety-eight amateur and professional naturalists were charter members, many of whom also belonged to the Philadelphia Botanical Club. Members were keenly interested in the unique aspects of the county’s geography, which attracted scientists primarily associated with Philadelphia-based institutions including the University of Pennsylvania, the Academy of Natural Sciences, and the Fels Planetarium of the Franklin Institute.

From 1946 forward, every week throughout the summer, the Society presented lectures, led nature walks, and sponsored special events. In the first years, various aspects of natural history were exhibited at the Solarium, a building on the boardwalk near Convention Hall. In the early years, columns about various topics were published weekly in the Star and Wave as well as notices about the Society’s upcoming programs and activities. Each year beginning in 1947, Bulletins were published reporting the Society’s activities along with articles authored by various Society members about the wide variety of natural resources in Cape May County.

The Society’s accomplishments were summarized and reported in various editions of the Bulletin. The Society grew from 116 to 315 members in its first decade, as reported in the June 1956 issue. Ten annual Bulletins were published, including articles written by nationally recognized naturalists and historians. Each year, nature walks included a walk through Bennett Bog Wildlife Sanctuary (located in Lower Township on the east side of the Shunpike between Tabernacle and Academy Roads). Dr. Ernest Choate led two bird nature walks each year, and others led nature walks focused on plants, seashells, local history, or other aspects of natural history. In 1949, the Society published Trees of Cape May County by Robert C. Alexander. A Field List of Birds of Cape County by Ernest Choate followed in 1950, and, in 1954, a Book of Cape May County Maps was assembled by Horace Richards. These publications are still widely used and, while over 50 years old and out of print, are available in Cape May County libraries.

In 1976, the Bulletin highlighted the Society’s first 30 years of activities, beginning with a question: “How could a natural history society be founded in a small seashore resort without a sponsoring organization or government grants?” The answer lies with the unique resources available in that small seashore resort and its long-standing relationships with Philadelphia institutions. Cape May was, and remains, a major birding location where tens of thousands of birds concentrate at the tip of the Cape May Peninsula during their southbound fall migration along the eastern seaboard. The same routes are used by migrating butterflies. As early as the late 1700s/early 1800s, naturalists were attracted to Cape May County not just to observe and track the varieties of birds, but also to study other aspects of natural history such as plants, trees, shorelines, ancient life, minerals, and insects. 

Otway Brown, a founding Society member and well-known local botanist, was the long-time gardener for Mrs. Ralston at the Physick estate, today’s Washington Street home of MAC [Museum + Arts + Culture]. In 1900, when Brown was 23 years old, he began working for the Physicks. The grounds of the estate were filled with gardens created by Brown and Mrs. Ralston. Today’s Tennis Club clubhouse was originally the gardener’s shed where the estate’s garden plants were cultivated. A self-educated botanist, Brown compiled a catalog of hundreds of plants in Cape May County with locations where they were found, habitat descriptions, and status (common to rare). He completed the manuscript, titled Plants of Cape May County, New Jersey, Collected from 1893 to 1931, just prior to his death. The original manuscript is in the archives of the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, and a bound copy is in the Cape May County Court House Library. The few remaining other copies of this work are prized by those fortunate enough to have one.

Otway Brown assisted other naturalists who visited Cape May County throughout the early 1900s. He and prominent ornithologist Witmer Stone, author of Bird Studies of Old Cape May, printed in 1937 shortly before Stone’s death, were two of the original naturalists to begin recording the county’s wealth of unusual and unique species. The county’s abundant and varied natural riches were a naturalist’s dream. These resources, Brown’s and Witmer’s early interests, and those of other nationally known expert naturalists were a foundation for the creation of the Cape May Geographic Society.

Ten notable naturalists representing seven fields of natural science served as the Society’s 1946 inaugural Advisory Board. Each represented different natural science fields. The June 1977 31st Annual Bulletin presented an overview of the Society’s first 30 years, noting that “It is doubtful if a society could be founded today like the Cape May Geographic Society, embodying ten scientific specialists banded together with no chance of monetary gain, but for the sole purpose of serving as a link between the vacationing public and naturalists.”  Drs. Francis Pennell, John M. Fogg, and Edgar Wherry were botanists, all born in the Philadelphia area and educated at the University of Pennsylvania. Even today, they are well-known, remembered as pioneers in natural science for their substantial contributions to the study of botany, and Wherry, also, of mineralogy. Fogg and Wherry were faculty members at the University of Pennsylvania and Pennell was Curator of Plants at the Academy of Natural Sciences.

Robert Crozer Alexander, neither a member of the founding Advisory Committee nor exactly a scientific naturalist, served as an 11th advisor to the Society. A meticulous researcher, Alexander had a lifelong interest in the environment and history of Cape May. A prolific writer, he published seven books and more than 50 articles in his lifetime, some of which were published by the Geographic Society. Ho for Cape Island, published in 1956, remains a sought-after publication about the history of Cape May City. Alexander and the 10 natural scientist members of the founding Advisory Board helped organize the Society’s summer programs, provided materials for exhibits, gave lectures, led nature walks, and contributed articles to the Bulletin.

Few of these scientists would be known today other than by present-day scholars or people with similar interests except for James Bond, whose name is recognized by most everyone in the public. Bond was a world-famous ornithologist, author of a seminal book, Birds of the West Indies, and Curator of Ornithology at the Academy of Natural Sciences. Author Ian Fleming, himself an enthusiastic birdwatcher, was in Jamaica reading Birds of the West Indies while trying to find a name for the main character in a new spy thriller he was writing. In a 1961 magazine interview, years after the first 007 Bond book was published in 1953, Fleming explained: “There really is a James Bond, you know, but he’s an American ornithologist, not a secret agent.  I’d read a book of his, and when I was casting about for a natural-sounding name for my hero, I recalled the book and lifted the author’s name outright.” Bond and his wife Mary eventually met Fleming in 1964. According to Mary, the two got along famously once Fleming was convinced that he was not going to be sued.

Over the years, the membership of the organization included new natural science professionals and interested amateurs, but the basic structure of the annual programs remained the same. For years during the summer months, the Society continued its activities and programs. By the 1960s, the Society was organized with five officers and 10 committees to plan and arrange the programs. Adults involved their children in the Society’s popular nature walks and lectures. New members like F. Russell Lyons and William Bailey, both of whom did work for The Saturday Evening Post, the Walter Young, John Mather, and George Clark families, Clay and Patricia Sutton, and Keith Seager became active committee members and officers. They joined founding members Ernest Choate, brother and sister Horace and Marie Richards, and Robert Alexander in leading the Society’s work. Over more than 20 years, ornithologist Dr. Ernie Choate led two bird walks during the summer and published an article about Cape May birding in each annual Bulletin. F. Russel Lyons’s major interest was architecture; during the 1950s, he lectured and conducted walks to showcase the architecture of Cape May. Perhaps you have visited the still-popular Higbee Beach and Signal Hill, now a state Wildlife Management Area along the most southern tip of the Delaware Bay, running from New England Road east to what today is called Sunset Beach. There John Mather led walks discussing the history of the Indigenous people, known as the Lenni Lenape, and their contributions to the county’s natural resources.    

Dr. Horace Richards, a geologist and one of the Society’s founding members, was an instrumental member from 1946 until his death in 1984. A summer resident of Cape May Point throughout his life, his exceptional research took him around the world studying and photographing shoreline conditions. Over the years, he wrote Bulletin articles about his travels and provided many lectures illustrated by slides of his own photography. A world-renowned scientist, Richards mentored younger Society members. Pat Sutton became the naturalist at the Cape May Point State Park in 1977 and remembers her visits with Richards: “Often in the summer I would go to the Richards’ home in the evening after work and we would look at photos that Horace had taken. One night, I shouted ‘Horace go back to the last slide. Do you know what you have here?” As the Cape May Point State Park naturalist, Pat fielded many questions about the World War II bunker. Horace Richards’ slide showed the bunker well inland and very well camouflaged before years of sea erosion. Today the bunker is no longer hidden but is out in the open and exposed to the elements, and tourists still want to know what this is and how it got there. Most of Richards’ slides are now housed, along with his prolific writings, in the archives of the Academy of Natural Sciences.

Bill Bailey, an illustrator and cover artist for TheSaturday Evening Post and good friend of Norman Rockwell, had a summer house at Cape May Point where Rockwell frequently visited during the summer. A self-taught botanist, Bailey was another of Pat’s mentors. Once a week he and Pat walked the Cape May Point Park trails as he pointed out various plants and taught her field botany. Pat recalls that Bill told many stories which she was then able to embed in the nature walks she conducted in her role as the park naturalist. These topics included birds, wildflowers, herbals and edibles, and butterflies. She ultimately became the naturalist and program director for New Jersey Audubon Society’s Cape May Bird Observatory, where she remained until 2007. Bolstered by the knowledge and support of Society experiences, Pat and her husband Clay, longtime residents of Cape May County, not only have been life-long advocates and supporters of preserving Cape May’s natural resources but also have published four books about birding and butterflying that are used today by naturalists at the Jersey shore.   

Keith Seager, also a current resident of Cape May County, along with the Suttons, was a younger and later member of the Geographic Society who continued to work in tracking and recording both birds and plants. A self-taught birder and botanist, Seager not only was President of the Society from 1980 to 1985, but led many of the nature walks in well-known areas such as Higbee Beach and Bennett Bog–and far lesser-known places in the county like the Rio Grande Swamp. Keith will tell you that the annual recorded counts for birds, butterflies, and plant species are becoming lower each year, as encroachments like land development turn areas where plants thrive into housing developments, or insecticide use eliminates the insects that annoy humans but provide food for birds.

Over the years, the Society’s membership dwindled, older and founding members passed on; many of the county’s natural resources were purchased and managed by not-for-profit organizations or state agencies. The Society’s once-unique niche in southern Cape May County was increasingly shared with other groups. Today’s numerous nature organizations include the New Jersey Audubon’s Cape May Bird Observatory and Nature Center of Cape May, The Nature Conservancy (South Cape May Meadows, Garrett Family Preserve), the Wetlands Institute, Cape May Point State Park, and Higbee Beach Wildlife Management Area, among others. Primarily non-existent when the Cape May Geographic Society was founded, they now protect thousands of acres of Cape May’s natural resources.

Fifty years after the Society’s founding, one plan was to restructure the organization to financially support a long-term lecture series honoring this unique organization. But this plan never panned out, and instead the organization was shifted over to a new person and president, Jonathan Maslow, an eccentric and award-winning journalist and author, residing in Dennisville. The Society retained its traditional structure but moved its location. The last Bulletins were published in 1989, 1990, and 1991, but memberships were not solicited, and nature walks were inconsistently scheduled. Some lectures, generally poorly attended, continued but were scheduled in Cape May Court House, further reducing participation and membership.

Eventually the Society faded away, but what remains of its extraordinary accomplishments are numerous published books and pamphlets, 44 annual Bulletins with more than 100 reports about Cape May history, annual Christmas bird count reports, and stories about butterflies, plants, insects, and other natural resources. There are birdwatching platforms and trails that are still around for all of us, and those nature-loving and bird-watching visitors, to enjoy. While those early prominent natural scientists who came to explore the Cape established a foundation for the natural resources we have today, there are still a few parents, children, and grandchildren with family stories and memories about the Society.

And there are those then-young naturalists, a legacy of those original Society scientist members, who passed on their deep caring about this special and unique area to the Suttons and Keith Seager, who are still doing the work in Cape May today as they were taught so many years ago by their mentors.