The Bird Singer

March 21, 2005 7:18 AM

Charles Kellogg was born in 1868 in California and claimed to have the larynx of a bird (called a syrinx). Until his death in 1949, he lectured and entertained audiences as a performer of bird calls. He travelled across the continent in the Travel Log, a mobile home carved from a single Redwood log mounted on a 1917 Nash Quad truck chassis. In 1939, he smuggled samples of the Kakaula plant out of Fiji in hopes of providing birth control leader Margaret Sanger with the perfect contraceptive.
posted by 327.ca (4 comments total)

Those birdcalls are pretty amazing! I love that he built the first motorhome. What a cool guy! What a cool post!
posted by LunaticFringe at 7:25 AM on March 21, 2005

Thanks for this wonderful FPP!
posted by filchyboy at 8:29 AM on March 21, 2005

Fascinating. Thank you.
posted by loquacious at 9:17 AM on March 21, 2005

The contraceptive link alone is very interesting. Thank you.
posted by raedyn at 12:22 PM on March 21, 2005