John James Audubon

John James Audubon (born Jean-Jacques Rabin, April 26, 1785 – January 27, 1851) was a French-American artist, entrepreneur, naturalist, explorer, and ornithologist. His combined interests in painting and ornithology turned into a plan to make a complete pictorial record of all the bird species of North America. He was notable for his extensive studies of American birds and for his detailed (yet romantic) illustrations, which were engraved in Scotland and England for a large-format (double-elephant folio) color-plate (intaglio) book titled The Birds of America (1827–1838), and five volumes of accompanying text entitled Ornithological Biography (1831–1839). Audubon's scientific contributions were considerable but controversial. He was accused of fraud, plagiarism, and scientific misconduct during his life as well as posthumously.