SKETCH OF FREDERICK WARD PUTNAM. 695 



In this year, also, he was appointed an assistant on the Geological 

 Survey of Kentucky, and passed several months in cave explorations. 

 It was at this time that Salt and Saunders Caves were thoroughly ex- 

 plored and so much of archaeological importance was discovered. A 

 report of these " finds " was published in the " Proceedings of the 

 Boston Society of Natural History." Important zoological results were 

 also obtained from the same and other caves, and accounts thereof pub- 

 lished in various journals of learned societies, and subsequently issued 

 as a separate volume, under the joint authorship of F. W. Putnam and 

 A. S. Packard, Jr. 



In September, 1874, on the death of Professor Jeffries Wyman, 

 Putnam, at the request of Professor Asa Gray, took temporary charge 

 of the collections of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology 

 and Ethnology, in connection with Harvard University. At the annual 

 meeting of the board of trustees, in January,' 1875, Putnam was ap- 

 pointed Curator of the Museum. That such action should have been 

 taken was most natural, as Professor Gray, in his single brief report 

 as curator pro tern., remarks : "As respects the care of the museum dur- 

 ing the short period in which I have endeavored to act as temporary 

 curator, while I have given to it such attention as I could, it was soon 

 evident that the lack of time and of the requisite technical knowledge 

 would prevent me from personally carrying on the work which had to 

 be done. I therefore availed myself of the permission granted at a 

 former meeting of the board, and engaged the valuable assistance of 

 Mr. F. W. Putnam, of Salem, who is better acquainted than any one 

 else with the museum, and with Dr. Wyman's method and arrange- 

 ments, having been much associated with him both in exploration and 

 publication." The above clearly shows that, of many who would have 

 gladly undertaken the care of the museum, no one was so eminently 

 fitted for the position. 



In 1876 Putnam was also appointed an assistant in the Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology, in charge of the collection of fishes, which duty 

 was undertaken and continued until 1878, when domestic affliction ne- 

 cessitated his resignation. 



In 1876 the Engineer Department of the United States Army ap- 

 pointed Putnam to take charge of and report upon the archaeological 

 collections made by the attaches of the Geological Survey, west of 

 the 100th meridian, Lieutenant George M. Wheeler in charge. The 

 report was finished in 1879, and constitutes Volume VII of the quarto 

 publications of that survey. In the preparation of this volume, Put- 

 nam was assisted by several specialists ; but his own hand is evident in 

 the general editorial supervision of all parts, and the exhaustive ar- 

 ticle, covering fifty-five pages, on perforated stones, by Putnam exclu- 

 sively, is one of the most complete and valuable contributions to pre- 

 historic archaeology by an American author. 



As indicative of the value of his scientific labors, we find that, be- 



