ANNALS OF THE ACADEMY 61 
vation can be obtained.” No objection appears to have been 
made, and on October 4, 1883, the Acting Chief Signal Officer 
of the Army announced to the committee of the Academy that 
President Garfield had, on September 20, 1883, proclaimed Mt. 
Whitney to be a military reservation. The fact was announced 
to the Academy in April, 1884, as appears from the report for that 
year, in which the following statement is made: 
“Tt was reported that the reservation of public lands on and 
near Mount Whitney, California, for scientific purposes, had 
been established, and the committee was continued, with the view 
to securing and utilizing the reservation for the said scientific 
purposes.” * 
It was not until fourteen years later that definite steps were 
taken for the utilization of the mountain summit. In the Smith- 
sonian Report for 1909 we find the following account of the 
circumstances under which it was brought about: 
“ Mount Whitney Expeditions. 
“Tn August, 1908, with Director Campbell, of the Lick Observatory, Mr. 
Abbot spent about twenty-four hours on the summit of Mount Whitney 
(14,502 feet). This mountain, which was the objective point of the famous 
expedition of Mr. Langley in 1881, was recommended by him to be reserved by 
the Government and used as the site for an observatory. The reservation was 
in fact, made, but no observatory has been established there. Mr. Abbot carried 
with him to Mount Whitney a pyrheliometer and wet and dry thermometers, 
and made observations on the summit both in the afternoon and morning hours. 
Both he and Mr. Campbell were favorably impressed with the advantages of the 
place for observing, and with the relative convenience of ascending the mountain, 
considering its great altitude. Fine building stone, sand, and water were found 
at the summit. Messrs. Campbell and Abbot, therefore, recommended to the 
Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution that a grant from the Hodgkins fund 
should be made for the purpose of erecting on the summit of Mount Whitney a 
stone and steel house to shelter observers who might apply to the Institution for 
the use of the house to promote investigations in any branch of science. This 
recommendation was approved, and the house is now in course of construction 
(July, 1909).” *° 
In the years 1882 and 1883 the Academy lost four of its 
original members, besides the President, Professor Wm. B. 
“Rep. Nat. Acad. Sci. for 1884, p. 11. 
*’ Smithsonian Report for 1909, pp. 65, 66. 
6 
