Margaret L. Bodine (July 27, 1876 — November 24, 1960) was an American naturalist, photographer and filmmaker, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was founder of the Lantern and Lens Gild, a women's photography club in Philadelphia.[1]
Early life
editMargaret Lamb Bodine was born in Gambier, Ohio, the daughter of Rev. William Budd Bodine (1841-1907) and Rachel Alice Allen Bodine (1840-1921). Her father was the president of Kenyon College from 1876 to 1891.[2] Judge Joseph Lamb Bodine was her first cousin; their fathers were brothers. She graduated from Harcourt Place Seminary in Gambier in 1891.[3][4]
Career
edit
In 1905, Bodine was a founder and first president of the Lantern and Lens Gild, a club for women photographers, which grew out of Mathilde Weil's photography classes for women at Drexel University.[5] Bodine and Nina Fisher Lewis shared first prize for a botanical photograph, second prize for an interior photograph, and second prize for a portrait, at the guild's first annual exhibition in 1913.[6][7]
Bodine photographed plants and animals, especially hummingbirds, finches, and flying squirrels, during summers in Northeast Harbor, Maine,[8] and made documentary films about them.[9] She wrote in detail about the equipment she used and the challenges she faced in this work. "I know of no branch of picture-taking more interesting than this special kind," she said of her work, adding that "there is infinite variety in it, sufficient difficulties to make it absorbing, and a very large proportion of rewarding results."[10]
Bodine was a member of the Amateur Motion Picture Club of America of Philadelphia. Films by Bodine included Humming-birds (1931), Ruby-Throated Humming-bird (1931). Bodine wrote articles about her work, including "Adventures in Taming Wild Birds at Birdbank" (1923),[11] and "Holiday with Humming Birds" (1928) for National Geographic magazine.[12] The latter article described rigging bottles of sweet liquid disguised as flowers to attract hummingbirds, and inspired the creation of blown-glass hummingbird feeders by Laurence and May Rogers Webster, soon after.[13][9][14]
Bodine spoke to the Woman's City Club in 1925,[15] the national conference of the National Audubon Society in 1930,[16] and to a meeting of the Geographical Society of Philadelphia in 1939.[17]
Personal life
editMargaret L. Bodine and Nina Fisher Lewis worked and lived together for over 40 years, until Lewis's death in 1948. Bodine received a life income from Lewis's estate, "in partial appreciation of her long friendship, devotion, and companionship."[18] She died in 1960, aged 84 years, in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania.
References
edit- ^ "Lantern and Lens Gild of Women Photographers records 1904-2004". discover.hsp.org. Retrieved 2018-12-13.
- ^ The National Cyclopedia of American Biography (J. T. White 1897): 8-9.
- ^ "Filmmaker: Margaret L. Bodine" Amateur Cinema Project (2018).
- ^ "Collegiate and Academic" The Churchman (August 8, 1891): 167.
- ^ Cary Hutto, "In 1905, a group of women from the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry began a club around this shared interest. What was it?" Historical Society of Pennsylvania (April 20, 2015).
- ^ "Camera Women Exhibit" Philadelphia Inquirer (March 13, 1913): 11. via Newspapers.com
- ^ John Bartlett, "Lantern and Lens Club Exhibition" Camera (May 1913): 248-255.
- ^ Arthur Stupka, "The Northern Flying Squirrel" Nature Notes from Acadia (January–February 1935).
- ^ a b Dan True, Hummingbirds of North America: Attracting, Feeding, and Photographing (University of New Mexico Press 1995): 82, 166. ISBN 9780826315724
- ^ Margaret L. Bodine, "A Summer on a Porch with a Graflex" The Camera (May 1922): 234-241; quote on page 241.
- ^ Margaret L. Bodine, "Adventures in Taming Wild Birds at Birdbank" Farm and Garden (February 1923): 11-17.
- ^ Margaret L. Bodine, "Holiday with Humming Birds" National Geographic (June 1928): 731-742.
- ^ "The Origins & History of Hummingbird Feeders" Hummingbird Market.
- ^ Nancy L. Newfield, Barbara Nielsen, Hummingbird Gardens: Attracting Nature's Jewels to Your Backyard (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 1996): 25. ISBN 9781881527879
- ^ "Camera Talk Given" Philadelphia Inquirer (May 27, 1925): 8. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Plans Complete for 1930 Meet of Audubon Society" Orlando Sentinel (March 6, 1930): 3. via Newspapers.com
- ^ Untitled brief news item, Philadelphia Inquirer (November 15, 1939): 25. via Newspapers.com
- ^ "Miss Lewis had $597,501 Estate" Philadelphia Inquirer (July 15, 1948): 19. via Newspapers.com
