Edwin Tappan Adney (July 13, 1868 – October 10, 1950), commonly known as Tappan Adney, was an American-Canadian artist, writer, and photographer. Biography Edwin Tappan Adney was born in Athens, Ohio, the eldest child of William Harvey Glenn Adney (1834–1885) from Vinton, Ohio, a professor at Ohio University, and Ruth Clementine Shaw Adney. When Tappan was five, the family moved to Washington, Pennsylvania where his father taught at Washington and Jefferson College. In 1879, his father retired from that position for health reasons and bought a tobacco farm near Pittsboro, North Carolina named Gum Spring Plantation. Tappan was exceptionally bright and entered the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill at the age of thirteen, where he remained for two years. New York After his father's death in a farm accident, his mother took him and his younger sister Mary Ruth to New York City to further their education. To earn a living, she ran a boarding house, where Tappan got to know his future wife Minnie Bell Sharp of Woodstock, New Brunswick, a piano and singing student, who was one of his mother's tenants. Tappan attended Trinity School and after leaving school he worked in a law office. In the evenings he took art classes at the Art Students League of New York. He graduated from art school at the age of eighteen and provided 110 illustrations for The Handbook of the Birds of Eastern North America. His interest in birds continued when he immigrated to Canada and a visitor remarked on his relationship with the birds around his bungalow in Upper Woodstock. He would whistle bird-calls and the birds would flutter around him and sometimes land on his head. Canoe-building In 1887, Tappan and his sister visited Minnie's family at their home in Woodstock, New Brunswick. Adney intended to spend a month in Woodstock preparing for the entry examination for Columbia University. While in Woodstock, he met Peter Jo, a Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet) canoe-builder. He became interested in the language and culture and with Joseph's help, he built his first canoe, spending twenty months in Woodstock. In 1890, he wrote an article on canoe-building for a Harper's Young People supplement. He was credited with saving the art of birchbark canoe construction. He built more than 100 models of different types, which are now housed at the Mariners' Museum in Newport News, Virginia. Writer and illustrator From 1890 onwards, Adney