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including those people who liked to use those birds for target practice. They would kill literally hundreds if not thousands. And I think I'm not exaggerating if I say that each season the southern migration would leave thousands of dead hawks lying at the foot of this ridge over which the winds flowed, carrying hawks soaring southward. Raptors, mostly hawks, but including eagles.

Mrs. Edge's appeal letters came in. I would send her $10 or something like that. She had my name on a list. And one day I got a note from her. She said she knew I was a big supporter of the Emergency Conservation Committee and she was coming through Washington. I was at that time working on the Washington Post.

I said, “Sure, I'll be glad to meet you at Union Station.” I think she thought she was going to meet a potentially big contributor because I'd been a very minor but steady contributor for a few years. I'll never forget the look on Mrs. Edge's face when she saw me: a twenty- three or four year old youngster come to meet her. She was only between trains, and we were going to have lunch down there. She nearly fainted dead away when she saw that I was really a kid and obviously didn't have any money, but we had a nice talk and she went on up to New York by train. Last October, about two months ago now, I had the pleasure of taking my grandson who's very interested in birds and natural history, together with my wife and my daughter to Hawk Mountain in Eastern Pennsylvania, which is now a world- known refuge, a conservation area for the study and protection and preservation of raptors. It's a world-class institution now, after 60 years, and we spent two days down there just looking at hawks, that's all. It's a very important little area and it's entirely due to Mrs. Edge and her devotion to this cause. At that time it was just a few acres of protected land,