History is found everywhere on the Island. Christie Palmer Lowrance hopes her first published children’s book, The Last Heath Hen: An Extinction Story, documents an important part of that story.

The tale of the heath hen is a Vineyard story.

Buried deep within the woods of the Manuel Correllus State Forest is a statue of Booming Ben, the world’s final heath hen. Once common, the species was hunted to near-extinction in the 1870s.

A single male heath hen, almost certainly the sole survivor of its species in the whole world, showed itself this week.

An effort to bring the heath hen back into existence is now the leading de-extinction project in the world, putting the Vineyard at the forefront of new technology in wildlife conservation.

The first phase of a ground-breaking project to bring the heath hen back from extinction has been successfully completed, scientists said this week. The path to bringing back the bird is getting more tangible, and scientists say the heath hen could be “the gateway bird” for avian de-extinction.