FROM THE CHAIRMAN 



As the Museum nears its 100th birthday, its work be- 

 comes ever more important and urgent. We are aided in 

 this task by generous friends from both the private and 

 public sectors. "Time Future from Time Past" was the 

 theme of the $40 million capital campaign which you over- 

 subscribed. Your contributions of time, money, and pri- 

 vate collections have exceeded our expectations. We are 

 grateful for that, and we believe you can be proud of the 

 work your efforts have supported. 



Our 1986 strategic plan. Centennial Directions, man- 

 dates that the Museum perform two basic functions. As a 

 research institute it collects, catalogs, and analyzes flora 

 and fauna and artifacts from human cultures worldwide — 

 19 million specimens so far — and makes this knowledge 

 available to the scientific community. Then, in the public 

 museum, it groups and displays these objects in inter- 

 pretive exhibits. The common denominator of the 



Museum's collection and research activities and its work 

 in public education is perhaps best expressed by John 

 Muir's observation: "When we try to pick out anything by 

 itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe." 



Because Field Museum recognizes just how 

 "hitched" we are to all other species inhabiting this planet, 

 our scientists are leaders in conservation biology. Civiliza- 

 tion long ago stripped the world's temperate regions of 

 natural habitats that were home to millions of species, and 

 now this process of destruction is under way at the poles 

 and in the tropics. Field Museum researchers are in the 

 forefront of efforts to find, identify, and preserve as many 

 of these species as possible before their habitats are des- 

 troyed. 



Other research groups in the Museum have been 

 working on problems in geology and anthropology that 

 also involve the diversity and interrelationships of species 

 and cultures. In the new paleomagnetism laboratory, our 

 scientists are exploring how evolution is affected by the 

 changing face of the Earth itself, as continental drift has 

 separated creatures from their cousins and native en- 

 vironments. Likewise, our anthropologists study evolution 

 as they examine the nature of sociocultural change and 

 stability, and the origins of ethnic diversity. 



Like the research departments, the public museum 

 focuses on diversity — not only in presenting displays of 

 the diversity of the natural world and human cultures, but 

 also in creating programs to meet the needs and interests 

 of a diverse public. Centennial Directions gave us a plan 

 for doing that, and visitors can see the results in the 

 dramatic changes that have taken place in the Museum's 

 physical appearance and exhibits. 



By the time of the Museum's centennial in 1993 we 

 expect that the Museum will have much to celebrate. We 

 will celebrate not only what the Museum has done, but its 

 vital future role — to advance both our knowledge of the 

 natural world and a public spirit of protectiveness toward 

 the living planet to which all our futures are hitched. The 

 Museum's vast systematic collections will serve as an 

 invaluable resource in assessing and addressing the 

 growing challenges of biodiversity. 



You have bought the biosphere a little more time by 

 investing in your Museum. What we have done with those 

 resources in the past two years is set forth in the report that 

 follows. I can only add that the enthusiastic and imagina- 

 tive ways in which the staff and volunteers have re- 

 sponded to the challenges of Centennial Directions give 

 me great confidence that we can maintain the momentum 

 into the Museum's second century. 



Robert A. Pritzker 



