Ira Gabrielson was born on September 27, 1889,[1] in Sioux Rapids, Iowa, in which he attended and later graduated from Morningside College, in 1912.
[3] He became a director of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, before which he served as chief of the old Bureau of Biological Survey of the Agriculture Department.
During that time, he served as a deputy coordinator of fisheries and a U.S. delegate to the International Whaling Conference and had responsibility for adding millions of acres to the National Wildlife Refuge System.
He was called upon by the governor to the Virginia Outdoor Study Commission, in 1966, during which year he drafted a plan on how to conserve and develop the state's natural resources.
He joined expeditions to the Andes, the Amazon, Europe, the Mediterranean, South Pole, and Alaska, all in the name of birds.