William Finley, Wildlife Photography Pioneer

The historian Douglas Brinkley credits William Finley as being one amongst a group of photographers that helped popularize wildlife photography. Growing up in Northern California and Oregon, Finley spent his time roaming the wilderness and developed an interest in birding. He would often collect specimens of rare bird species and eggs.

When he was 18, he formed the North Western Ornithology Association with childhood friend Herman Bohlman. Contemporaneously, it had become fashionable for women to wear bright bird feathers in their hats. The market demands of the millinery industry were pushing many species to threatened levels, especially birds like egrets, pelicans, terns, and puffins. With the rise in this trend came a consequent rise in environmental awareness, something that was not lost on the avid naturalist Finley. He decided to transition from collecting actual specimens to catching them on film. Not only could it help him document the variety, behavior, and habitat of certain species, but it could be used to disseminate this information to a wider public.

Finley’s photography portfolio is prolific. His photographs were often part of larger articles he penned for magazines such as Nature and National Geographic. He waded through streams, climbed trees, braved harsh weather, and scaled rock faces all with equipment in tow. Perhaps his most famous photographs were taken in his native Oregon. In fact, pictures taken at Three Arch Rocks on the northern Oregon Coast were instrumental in cultivating support for a wildlife refuge on the same spot, which was established by President Teddy Roosevelt in 1907.

Brinkley extols his photographs calling them “pioneering wildlife photography gems”¹. You can view some of these influential works of art on Oregon State University’s digital archive on Flickr.

¹Brinkley, Douglas. The Wilderness Warrior. (New York: Harper Collins, 2009). 549.