a magical afternoon

Approximately five minutes south of campus, along a road where the trees give way to open field, there’s a barn. It’s a small barn; judging by the overgrown cement foundations, the building must have been three or four times larger than it is today.

When you enter through the double doors, at first, it doesn’t look like anything special—the ground floor is occupied by tools, wood, equipment, all the odds and ends you might expect to find in a barn. But follow the barn’s owner up the wooden stairs, and you’ll discover an absolute treasure trove of natural history—hundreds upon hundreds of personally collected butterflies, too many books to count, shells, historical artifacts, photographs and paintings and sculptures, giant mineral specimens, and dozens upon dozens more unusual items, each with its own story.

This is Chris Livesay’s personal natural history collection.

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