Journeys
The expeditions, reassembled
Every dated label is a diary entry. Read a collector’s labels in order and the voyage comes back: the islands in sequence, the days at each, the specimens from every stop. 5 journeys so far, 1920 to 1977, 1,450 specimens between them.
4 collectors and expeditions170 days in the field3,176 km between stops987 photographed specimens
5 journeys match
Elwood Curtin Zimmerman
4 islands · May – Aug 1940
Elwood Curtin Zimmerman across 4 islands, May – August 1940616 specimens · 10 stops · 86 days · 181 km
W.A. Whistler
11 islands · May 1976 – Jan 1977
W.A. Whistler across 11 islands, May 1976 – January 1977301 specimens · 62 stops · 237 days · 2,182 km
Erling Christophersen
5 islands · Oct – Nov 1929
Erling Christophersen across 5 islands, October – November 1929315 specimens · 20 stops · 44 days · 283 km
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William A. Setchell
3 islands · Jun – Jul 1920
William A. Setchell in Tutuila, Aunuu and Rose Atoll, June – July 1920175 specimens · 32 stops · 51 days · 21 km
W.A. Whistler
5 islands · Dec 1975 – Jan 1976
W.A. Whistler across 5 islands, December 1975 – January 197643 specimens · 13 stops · 21 days · 509 km
How a journey is found
Every specimen with a full date and a known collector is a diary entry. The days are read in order; a gap of more than three weeks ends one journey and starts the next. Days spent where a collector lived most of their life are home, not travel, and are left out.
A journey needs at least five days, forty specimens and two places. Within it, a run of days spent within about ten kilometres is one stop; the stop’s point is the middle of the labels that carry coordinates, or the island’s centre when none do.
Companions are the people whose own labels put them in the same place on the same days. Staff can name a journey, write about it and feature it; everything else here is read straight off the specimens, and is rebuilt as the records improve.