Raccoon
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Raccoon. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
an American flesh-eating animal. The racoon belongs to a class of animals halfway between the bear and the dog. Early naturalists, in fact, considered the raccoon a sort of bear from the way he walks on the last joint of his legs. The common raccoon is found in timbered regions from Hudson Bay to Louisiana, except where he has been exterminated by settlers. The raccoon is usually spoken of as masculine. He is twenty-six inches long. His tail measures eight inches. He weighs from twenty to twenty-five pounds. His head is round, with a sharp, delicate nose, and a cunning, sly, foxy face. He is considered as cunning as a fox, as meddlesome as a monkey, as greedy as a bear, and as sly as a cat. He has long legs with strong claws, and is famous as a tree climber. The rac-coon is partial to forests on marshy ground or along streams. His favorite food consists of eggs, frogs, mussels, turtles, and any small animal that he can catch. He is addicted to robbing birds' nests whether in trees or along the water's edge like those of the duck or goose. The raccoon is fond of staying in the water--not swimming but paddling. He likes to soak his food before eating. "Coons," although flesh-eaters, are fond of corn and do great damage to cornfields. Hunters go out at night with lanterns, dogs, and guns along the edges of their corn fields. The dogs chase the "coon" out of the fields and tree him, keeping up a loud baying until the hunters come and either chop down the tree so that the dogs can catch the coon, or shoot him as he sits above in the branches. A roasted coon is considered a great delicacy. Coon skins, if taken in the winter season, are much prized for sleigh robes and overcoats. A coon-skin cap is traditional. The pelt of the coon is the only one in the market with black and gray rings around the tail. In northern climates the coon family retires into a hollow tree and sleeps through the winter; but in the south they are active the year around. The nest of a coon is made usually in the hollow of a tree. From four to six young, half the size of a rat, are produced at a time. Coons are easily tamed, and are amusing, but exceedingly troublesome about a house. They are greedy and inquisitive, and must be kept chained. A crab-eating raccoon, with the general habits of the animal we have just described, is found in South America and along our Pacific coast as far north as California. It is fond of fish and sugar-cane. Raccoon
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
or RACOON, the genus Procyon and especially P. lotor, a handsome animal, about the size of a large cat, brown furry hair; tail bushy and ringed; body large and unwieldy, legs short, feet with strong fossorial claws. It is omnivorous and ranges over a large part of North America, where it is hunted for its fur. The crab-eating raccoon (P. cancrivorus), from South America, ranging as far N. as Panama, differs chiefly from the former in the shortness of its fur, and consequent slender shape.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Aiton's described the raccoon in 1910 as a creature of timbered marshland, hunted by lantern and hound "except where he has been exterminated by settlers," it was a wild animal in retreat. It is now one of the most successful mammals in North America, thriving in cities from Toronto to Washington, and its range has spread north and west well beyond the Hudson Bay-to-Louisiana belt described. Escaped and released fur-farm animals founded European populations after a 1934 release near Kassel in Germany, and raccoons are now a widespread invasive species there and in Japan; they are also a major carrier of a rabies strain in the eastern United States. Aiton's claim that the crab-eating raccoon reaches "our Pacific coast as far north as California" is wrong / Collier's 1921 more accurately stops it at Panama; the family Procyonidae is today placed with the weasels, bears and red panda in the order Carnivora rather than "halfway between the bear and the dog."
Written for this edition, 2026.