REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1919. 49 



Bell telephone system in the District of Columbia. He made himself 

 the historian of the beginnings of this industry by his many reminis- 

 cent articles, both on the telephone and the telegraph. 



As he grew older his knowledge was often sought by the authori- 

 ties of the United States National Museum, and his interest in the 

 growth of the collection was so genuine that is 1886 he was called 

 to the care of the section of electricity. His association with the 

 greatest minds in the inventive world gave him opportunities to add 

 materially to his section. It may be said that his contributions to 

 the division of mechanical technology, of which he became curator 

 in 1912, though in charge from 1903, have been such as to render 

 its present enlargement in great part the result of his untiring energy''. 



Edwin Porter Upham, who had been associated with the archeo- 

 logical collections of the Museum since 1878, died on August 7, 1918. 

 He was bom in Weston, Massachusetts, March 6, 1845, the son of Joel 

 and Elizabeth Upham. He received a public school education, and at 

 the age of 19 joined the Forty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteer Eegi- 

 ment and was with that regiment during the remaining nine months 

 of the Civil War. In 1878 he came to Washington, where he entered 

 the service of the Smithsonian Institution as assistant to Dr. Charles 

 Rau, the noted archeologist. He remained with Doctor Eau until 

 the latter's death, and later became associated with Dr. Thomas Wil- 

 son. In 1906 he was made aid in the division of prehistoric arche- 

 ology, which position he held at the time of his death. His services 

 in the National Museum, always faithful and efficient, extended over 

 the exceptionally long period of 39 years and 8 months. Mr. Upham 

 early developed musical talent, and for a long period was violinist 

 in the Georgetown Orchestra. His proficiency as a musician was ap- 

 plied to the study of the scales of the numerous prehistoric musical 

 instruments in the national collections and formed the basis of sev- 

 eral papers by Doctor Wilson, including his chapters on wind instru- 

 ments in the Report of the United States National Museum for 1896. 



Frederick Knab was born in Wurzburg, Bavaria, September 22, 

 1865, and came to the United States with his parents, who settled 

 in Chicopee, Massachusetts, in 1873. He inherited the artistic tem- 

 perament of the family and early devoted himself to drawing and 

 painting; but at the same time an interest in natural history led to 

 the accumulation of a collection of beetles and a study of their 

 biologies. This interest became so strong that in 1885-86 he made 

 a trip up the Amazon River as far as Peru, accumulating much ma- 

 terial and information which in his later studies of entomology were 

 of utmost importance to him. 

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