In a nutshell
September 26, 2026
Travels on the Edge: A Naturalist's Notes From the Back of Beyond
There will always be parts of the world where politics, wars, or natural disasters make travel unwise, but very few that are naturally inaccessible. By sheer good fortune, I had a chance – and a reason – to explore some of those remote places. For fifty years, I served as a photographer, chronicler, and historian of research expeditions for the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia (now part of Drexel University). In that time, I traveled to some of the world’s most beautiful and interesting places under conditions that few have ever had, and that even fewer will ever have again. Travels on the Edge, A Naturalist’s Notes from the Back of Beyond (American Philosophical Society Press, 2026) is a collection of stand-alone essays about those experiences. In it, I recount some of the most memorable parts of a career that was, in many ways, a throwback to an earlier era.
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Travels on the Edge: A Naturalist's Notes From the Back of Beyond
Peck, R. M. (2026). Travels on the edge: A naturalist's notes from the back of beyond. American Philosophical Society Press.
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Robert M. Peck
An historian, naturalist and writer, Robert McCracken Peck was the humanist on staff at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia for fifty years, serving as Librarian, Curator of Art and Artifacts, Editor of Scientific Publications, Fellow, and then Senior Fellow of the Academy between 1976 and 2026. He holds a bachelor's degree, Magna-cum-Laude, from Princeton University and a Master of Arts degree from the Winterthur Program in American Cultural History from the University of Delaware (which gave him an honorary doctorate degree in 2012). In 1988 a new species of South American frog, one of three he discovered in the upper Amazon basin in Ecuador, was named in his honor.
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