[Signed] A Guide to Bird Watching Hickey, Joseph J. [Near Fine] [Hardcover]

Association copy, inscribed by Hickey to his daughter on the half title page: ""For Susi, with much love / Dad."" Also signed in full by Hickey on the title page. Fourth printing, 1951 (perhaps Susi was still young when the book first came out and wasn't ready for it). Uncommon signed. ""The first American book to describe the modern art of bird watching, as the jacket say (before bird watching became one word), this book helped popularize this pastime and highlighted its benefits as citizen science. Praise on the jacket from John Kieran and Edwin Way Teale. Hickey finished this book as his master thesis under the supervision of Aldo Leopold at the University of Wisconsin, where he later returned as a professor. Leopold hired him and then died tragically a year later, and Hickey took the reins of the department and, importantly, lead the charge in the posthumous publication of A Sand County Almanac. Hickey grew up birding with a young Roger Tory Peterson and was encouraged to pursue biology by Ernst Mayr--he was rubbing elbows, in all directions, with folks who are now legends. Later he went on to be pivotal in the study and protection of Peregrine Falcons as they became endangered due to DDT and eggshell thinning. Illustrations by Francis Lee Jaques (later a John Burroughs Medal-winner). Written on the illustrated front free endpaper is also the apparent ownership signature of Walter R. Spofford, a prominent AOU member who died in 1995. And above the inscription on the half-title page is written in pencil, in what appears to be Joseph Hickey's hand, brief citations for two articles in The Auk (probably reviews of the book). Included, also, is a thoughtful and charming remembrance by his daughter Susi Hickey Nehls (the recipient of this copy) entitled ""Joe Hickey's Last Lecture,"" which tells his history and shares anecdotes; written for a previous bookseller, it's double-sided, singled-spaced, with small inset color photos of her father. A near fine book, all in all, in a good/very good price-clipped dust jacket with tape reinforcement to spine ends and most corners and few small close tears. A terrific association and an important book in the development of natural history appreciation.