The Fashion of Roger Tory Peterson

When thinking about one of the world’s top artist-naturalists, the first question is rarely, “What did Roger Tory Peterson wear?” However, they do say that clothes make the man, and Roger Tory Peterson, like any other globetrotting individual, wore all sorts of outfits during his lifetime. He wore a bright red parka and Tam o’ Shanter when visiting his beloved Emperor Penguins in Antarctica. He constantly travelled—visiting fast-paced cities like London and New York while also lecturing on cruise ships and riding burros through South America.

Besides being an interesting stand-in for the man himself, clothes also possess a numinous or almost spiritual quality—connecting the viewer with the clothing’s owner in a way that artwork or other possessions cannot. These were Roger Tory Peterson’s clothes. He lived in them while painting and writing his field guides. He expressed himself through them—notice the penguin-patterned tie and bright yellow galoshes. Clothes possess a powerful pull to remind us of the person who wore them, coding him as a traditional artist, an educated man, an explorer—and, considering the delightfully patterned ties, a man not without a bit of whimsy.

Image credit: Roger Tory Peterson in Jamestown, 1962. Courtesy of the Peterson Family.