Before joining the Institute staff, Mr. Bridson, an English librarian, worked as the Zoological Department librarian at The Natural History Museum in London and later as librarian and archivist at The Linnean Society of London. At the Institute, Mr. Bridson maintains bibliographical records and compiles enumerative and systematic bibliographies within the Institute's program, in addition to providing bibliographical assistance to all departments of the Institute. Apart from his professional interests in the bibliography and history of natural history, Bridson pursues special research interests in the history of natural-history illustration and the technical history of picture-printing techniques from 1750–1900.
Mr. Bridson was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society of London in 1968. He has been a member of the Bibliographical Society (London), the Bibliographical Society of the University of Virginia, and the Society for the History of Natural History since the 1960s. In 1992, he received the Society for the History of Natural History's Founder's Medal.