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Audio clip, autobiographical, 1955-01-26
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| Title | Audio clip, autobiographical, 1955-01-26 |
| Creator | Darling, Jay N. (Jay Norwood), 1876-1962
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| Date Original | Dictation by Darling on January 26, 1955 |
| Subject - Topics | Duck shooting
Duck Stamp
Ducks
Conservation
Cartoonists
Civilization
United States. Biological Survey
Family life
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| Subject - People | Darling, Jay N. (Jay Norwood), 1876-1962
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| Type (DCMIType) | Sound
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| Type (AAT) | Sound recordings
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| Digital Collection | Editorial Cartoons of J.N. "Ding" Darling
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| Rights Management | Copyright is owned by the "Ding" Darling Wildlife Society; it is administered on behalf of the Society by The University of Iowa. While use within the classroom is encouraged without specific authorization, publishing this cartoon in any format requires written permission. See policy and permissions procedure at: http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/spec-coll/services/dingdarling_fees.html |
| Identifier | 55-01-26-1_autobio_clip1 |
| Language | English |
| Digital Format | mp3 |
| Full text | As a matter of fact, now that I come to think of it, I don't know anything of interest which I can say about myself.
At the ripe old age of seventy-eight looking back over the years, it seems as though I had never done anything since the day I was born but get up in the morning, fill the old cartoon mill with the news events of the day, put them in the colander to drain off the waste, just like Aunt Libby used to drain the whey from her daily output of cottage cheese, hoping there might be enough left with the addition of a little cream and seasoning from which to make an appetizing dish. Then go to bed, day after day, forever and ever amen. Repeat de capo al fin with nothing to show for it but a great file of old cartoons, most of them forgotten.
Of course, I paused now and then along the way, long enough to get married, raise two children, do a bit of hunting and fishing, sing at a few funerals, and last but not least, took two years off in Washington as the Chief of the U.S. Biological Survey where I tied the hands of the hunters long enough to let others who knew more about it than I did set up a program of national wildlife refuges for the rescue of wild ducks from threatened extinction. No one cared much about that except the ducks, who liked it, and the shooters, who at that time would have liked to skin me alive.
I look back at those two years with more satisfaction than anything I have done in my life. The conservation of natural resources had become an obsession as I had watched the devastation and criminal waste which accompanied the advancement of civilization march across the continent like an army of locusts consuming everything in its path and leaving exhausted soils, cut-over forests, and polluted rivers in its path. It was to apply the practical principles of conservation to the wasted lands and water resources of the country that I took time out from my daily routine of cartooning.
And it has always seemed to me that I accomplished more visible good in that two years than all the cartoons I made over the fifty years of my active newspaper work. The restoration of at least a little of the natural environment destroyed by man's unwise management will, I believe, stand forever and set an example for future generations if they can escape the grasping greed of exploiters, army engineers, and political ignorance.
So far as I can see, the cartoons never buttered any parsnips. |
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