National Park Service“James Lane Allen made the Cardinal the favored bird of Kentucky in his famous book of that name, and it was both natural and inevitable that it be established as the official State bird.” So wrote state bird fan Katherine Tippetts in 1932.
In fact, James Allen’s book had little to do with cardinals. But the title was apparently good publicity. In fact, Kentucky was probably the first state to adopt an official bird when it crowned the cardinal on February 17, 1926.
The resolution leading to the cardinal’s adoption refers to it as the “Kentucky cardinal.” (It has also been called the “Kentucky redbird” and “Virginia nightingale.”) A likeness of the cardinal even appears atop staffs carrying the state flag. The only other state bird accorded similar honors is Delaware’s Blue Hen Chicken, whose likeness appears on top of the flagstaff of Delaware’s Governor.
The one symbol that rivals the cardinal in Kentucky is bluegrass, source of the nickname Bluegrass State and formerly Kentucky’s state flower. The goldenrod replaced bluegrass as state flower a month after the cardinal’s adoption.
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