James Borman has moved on to the happy hunting ground, but his legacy will touch people throughout Wisconsin. Over his lifetime, he assembled a massive collection of preserved wildlife specimens from North America and elsewhere. Borman, who died in 1999, willed his collection to the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Instead of being sequestered in a single collection where most of it would never see the light of day, Borman”s collection is being widely distributed, where it will help to educate thousands of people every year, according to Scott Craven, a wildlife ecologist and Extension wildlife specialist at the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

“In terms of courses that deal with the natural history of local species, you can have photos, CD-ROMs and websites, but there”s no substitute for seeing the actual animals. If you can”t view a living animal in the wild, the next best thing is a first-rate specimen in the lab. And that”s what the Borman collection gave us and a lot of other people,” Craven said.

When he first inspected the collection at Borman”s house, Craven was flabbergasted. Borman lived in a modest house in a working-class neighborhood of Waukesha. From the street, you would never guess the bounty the house held, he said. “He had hundreds, if not thousands, of North American species, ranging from insects to a paddlefish to a polar bear skull.”

The collection ranged from moose and bison head mounts to full body mounts of wolves, badgers and owls to turtle shells, rattlesnake skins and butterfly displays. Among the more unusual entries: a sheep skull with a flint arrowhead embedded in it, a 20-foot python skin, and a duck-billed platypus (probably acquired in a trade). The collection included examples of just about every large mammal in North America, along with many small mammals and hundreds of birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish and insects.

With a new tenant waiting to occupy the house, Craven had to move the collection as quickly as possible. Fortunately, Feb. 26 dawned sunny and warm as Craven and 20 student volunteers moved the collection to the lawn and sidewalk. This created a neighborhood carnival atmosphere, with neighbors, passersby and even the Waukesha police stopping to inspect the motionless menagerie before it was loaded into three 17-foot trucks and two vans.

The volunteers spent all day transporting the collection to the UW-Madison campus. They moved hundreds of glass jars, delicate mounts, and other fragile items, and didn”t break a thing, Craven reported. The collection filled the attic of the UW Stock Pavilion.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agents and state game wardens have inspected the collection and certified that it was all pre-1960s, and thus legal to possess and distribute.

Today, it would be impossible to assemble a collection remotely resembling Borman”s, since the laws have changed regarding collection and possession of wildlife. For example, the collection included three large glass display cabinets filled with dozens of native songbirds — something that would be a federal offense to put together today. Taxidermy costs for the hundreds of heads and full body mounts would be astronomical, Craven added.

Craven chairs the UW Natural History Museums Council, which links all the UW-Madison collections. The bulk of the Borman collection will stay at the UW-Madison, with the remainder distributed to educational agencies throughout the state. In early April, Craven began distribution.

The UW-Madison Zoological Museum, the UW-Madison Wildlife Ecology department teaching collection, and the zoology department at the UW-Richland Center each got hundreds of specimens. The Vilas Zoo in Madison, Upham Woods Environmental Center at Wisconsin Dells, the 4-H Program, and wildlife and fisheries educational programs at the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources also shared in the bounty. The remainder will go to state parks and other other DNR facilities around the state. A vanload of “northwoods”-type things, including the moose head, went to the Kemp Natural Resources Station near Minocqua. A golden eagle went to the Fennimore School District, home of the Fennimore Golden Eagles.

Borman was a tool and die maker, and spent time as a hunter and a hunting guide in the Western United States. He was also a collector and a wheeler and dealer back when it was legal to do so, and he was a skilled taxidermist, according to Craven.

“The vast majority of this collection will be well-used throughout the state,” Craven said. “I”d like to think that if Mr. Borman knew where it was going and how it will be used, he”d be very pleased.”