In 2018 the AOS established a new service award meant to carry on the tradition of the Cooper Honorary Member Award, one of the oldest awards in ornithology. The new award is made in honor of a senior ornithologist who has given extraordinary service to the AOS or its predecessor societies, the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) and Cooper Ornithological Society (COS). The AOS Executive Committee tasked the Service Awards Committee with recommending a name for the new award. After an extensive search, they chose to honor Peter Stettenheim, whose service to ornithological societies was substantial and diverse. Peter was a council member and vice president (2001–2002) of the AOU, in which he was a Life Member, Elective Member, and Fellow. He was an editor of The Condor and of Life Histories of the Birds of North America (BNA), an Honorary Life Member of the Cooper Society, and a Patron and Investing Trustee of the Wilson Ornithological Society. He was a well-respected expert on avian anatomy and functional morphology, but his interest in ornithology was broad. Many of us knew Peter, who passed away in 2013, as a kind and gentle giant.

The 2018 Peter R. Stettenheim Service Award is presented to Anna Chalfoun. Now active in the AOS, Anna has a distinguished record of service to the COS and AOU. She served on the Miller Award Committee, the COS Nominations Committee in 2015, the Scientific Program Committee for the last NAOC, chaired the COS Student Awards Committee, was COS president-elect, was on the societies' Merger Advisory Committee, and now serves on the AOS Council and the Conservation Committee.

(left) Anna Chalfoun. (right) AOS President Steve Beissinger presenting Anna Chalfoun with her award at the 2018 AOS annual meeting in Tucson, Arizona.

In recognition of her outstanding and diverse service to the AOS and our earlier ornithological societies, the society is proud to name Dr. Anna D. Chalfoun as the first recipient of the Peter R. Stettenheim Service Award.