Wildlife collection will aid study of species

James Borman has moved on to the happy hunting ground, but his legacy will touch people throughout Wisconsin. Over his lifetime, he assembled a massive collection of preserved wildlife specimens from North America and elsewhere. Borman, who died in 1999, willed the collection to the university.

Borman’s collection is being widely distributed. It will help to educate thousands of people every year, says Scott Craven, a wildlife ecologist at the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

“In terms of courses that deal with the natural history of local species, you can have photos, CD-ROMs and web sites, but there’s no substitute for seeing the actual animals. If you can’t view a living animal in the wild, the next best thing is a first-rate specimen in the lab. And that’s what the Borman collection gave us and a lot of other people,” says Craven, who chairs the UW Natural History Museums Council.

When he first inspected the collection at Borman’s house, Craven was flabbergasted. Borman lived in a modest house in a working-class neighborhood of Waukesha. From the street, you would never guess the bounty the house held, he says. “He had hundreds, if not thousands, of North American species, ranging from insects to a paddlefish to a polar bear skull.”

The collection ranged from moose and bison head mounts to full body mounts of wolves, badgers and owls to turtle shells, rattlesnake skins and butterfly displays. The collection includes hundreds of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish and insects.

Borman was a tool and die maker, and spent time as a hunter and a hunting guide in the western United States. He was also a collector and a wheeler and dealer back when it was legal to do so, and he was a skilled taxidermist, Craven says. Today, it would be impossible to assemble such a collection because the laws have changed regarding collection and possession of wildlife. For example, the collection of dozens of native songbirds would be a federal offense if put together today.

The bulk of the Borman collection will stay at UW–Madison, with the remainder distributed to educational agencies throughout the state.