The Feather Heist

A flute player breaks into a British museum and makes off with a million dollars worth of dead birds. Prologue: After hearing about the heist, Kirk Wallace Johnson gets sucked into the feather underground. He ends up discovering things that the people in charge of the theft investigation didn’t. Kirk’s book about the heist is called “The Feather Thief." (7 minutes) The Specimens: The birds Edwin Rist stole were valuable and collected in the mid-1800s by one of the greatest scientific explorers of his time: a man named Alfred Russel Wallace. (6 minutes) The Flautist: Edwin's life in a rarified world of flutes and feathers. (5 minutes) The Museum: Edwin visits a branch of Britain's Natural History Museum in a little town called Tring. (3 1/2 minutes) The Heist: The detective on the case takes Kirk to the crime scene. (6 minutes) The Investigation: The police track Edwin down after a fly-tier turns in a tip. (6 1/2 minutes) The Suspect: Kirk wonders if Edwin has a sidekick who helped him the night of the Tring heist. (5 minutes) Oslo: In Norway, Kirk tracks down fugitive feathers. (16 minutes)