PHILADELPHIA, September 10, 2018

The Academy Town Square Series kicks off this fall with an open discussion about how to make your vote count for the environment in the upcoming election. And just after the election, presidential hair gets the combover in a talk by the author of a new book on a fascinating Academy hair collection.

Academy Town Square programs at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University are free and all are encouraged to lend their voice to the discussion. To ensure a seat, registration is recommended. Here are the first two talks in the series. Check ansp.org for future talks.

The Academy Town Square series is designed to engage and provide relevant educational content to the public on environmental issues. Academy Town Squares focus on critical global issues in environmental science by featuring prominent thought leaders and their findings on water, climate change, evolution and biodiversity and extinction.

Academy Town Square

Voting for the Environment

6:30 p.m. Wednesday, October 24

Free

Register: Visit ansp.org at https://bit.ly/2QgIIhs

When it comes to the health of the planet, you want to make sure your vote counts. “Voting for the Environment,” a free program in the Academy Town Square series, features a roundtable discussion with leaders of the League of Conservation Voters, PennFuture, Clean Air Council, and the Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership, Inc. Learn about the important issues that affect the local and global environment and how the upcoming election will influence them. Join us for this interactive discussion that will help you become a better citizen. Our featured speakers are:

Josh McNeil

Executive Director, Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania

Vice President for Civic Engagement, PennFuture

Julie Slavet
Executive Director
Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership, Inc.

Joseph Minott, Esq.

Executive Director and Chief Counsel 

Clean Air Council

Moderator:

Roland Wall

Director, Patrick Center for Environmental Research

Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University

Academy Town Square

Presidential Hair: A Close Shave with History

6:30 p.m. Wednesday, November 14

Book signing follows talk

Free

Register: Visit ansp.org at https://bit.ly/2NSX4D8

In the early 1800s Peter A. Browne, a Philadelphia lawyer and member of the Academy of Natural Sciences, assembled an extraordinary collection of wool, fur and hair. He hoped, in a pre-Darwinian world, to discover how animals were related to each other and what practical purposes their hair might serve. The remarkable collection, now housed at the Academy, also includes hair from well-known artists, writers, scientists, signers of the Declaration of Independence, and 13 of the first 14 U.S. presidents. The Academy’s Robert McCracken Peck has written a new book, Specimens of Hair, on this fascinating subject and will give an illustrated talk at the Academy Town Square. A book signing will follow the talk. A writer, naturalist and historian, Peck has written for a wide range of popular and scholarly publications and is the author of numerous books, including A Glorious Enterprise: The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia and the Making of American Science.