Allan Brooks was born at Etawah, northern India, on February 16th, 1869.  Allan’s father, William Edwin Brooks, was a civil engineer and amateur ornithologist.  While stationed in India with the East Indian Railroad, William Brooks studied bird life with a passion and spent much of his spare time collecting bird specimens for the British Museum.  William Brooks was good friends with Allan Octavian Hume (1829-1912), a civil servant in British India and one of the founders of the Indian National Congress, a political party that was later to prove instrumental in the Indian independence movement.  Hume, like William Brooks, was an amateur ornithologist and was once referred to as “the Father of Indian Ornithology.”  William Brooks named his son Allan after Hume.

William Brooks had hoped one of his sons (there were three boys and two girls in the family) would become an ornithologist and Allan showed promise in this field early in his childhood.  At the age of only two Allan often handled his father’s bird specimens and was considered then to have a born talent for being a naturalist.

In 1873, Allan was sent to England where he spent the next eight years living with his grandmother and maiden aunt while attending school in Northumberland.

A special friend of William Brooks, John Hancock (1808-1890), “considered to be the father of modern taxidermy,” spent a lot of time with Allan and taught him about butterfly collecting, botany, and basic taxidermy.  It was said that Allan considered such things as board games or sports a waste of time and he preferred taking walks in the moors and observing wildlife.

In 1881, William Brooks retired from his work in India.  Although he was still a young man, William’s wife, Mary, was in poor health and it was recommended that she be taken to Canada where she could live in a healthier environment.  Wanting only the best for his wife, William packed up his entire family and sailed for eastern Canada.  Sadly, shortly after their arrival in Quebec, Mary Brooks passed away.  She was only 44 years of age.

Mary Brooks was buried in Quebec.  William then moved on to Milton, Ontario, where he attempted to make a home for himself and his children on a 200-acre farm.

William Brooks continued with his studies in ornithology and, over the ensuing years, many leading naturalists, ornithologists, and taxidermists in the region and from Europe came to visit, and sometimes stay for extended periods at the Brooks’ farm.  During these years, Allan spent much of his time preparing bird skins, sketching, reading numerous books on bird identification, and accompanying his father and visitors on field trips.  
