THE N. W. HARRIS PUBLIC SCHOOL EXTENSION 



In accordance with long-established procedures the Department of 

 the N. W. Harris Public School Extension operated normally during 

 the year in lending portable Museum exhibits and circulating them 

 from school to school throughout the city. A total of 17,510 of the 

 department's standard portable exhibits was delivered on routine 

 schedule. The two trucks maintained by the department were in 

 operation 171 days and traveled 11,420 miles. 



At the beginning of the year 1,032 exhibits were out on loan to 

 516 schools and public-service institutions on the circulation list. 

 On every tenth school-day the two exhibits held by each school (or 

 other institution) were exchanged for two others. The sixteen ex- 

 changes made in addition to the initial loan-delivery of the school- 

 year gave each school thirty-four different exhibits within the year. 

 Pick-up of all exhibits at the end of the school-year for cleaning and 

 summer storage in the Museum began on June 10 and was completed 

 on June 25. Delivery of the first exhibit-loans of the school-year 

 began on September 9 and ended on September 25. At the end of 

 December the circulation list totaled 517. Over the twelve-month 

 period five schools had been dropped from the list, while five others 

 and a boys' club had been added. 



Rotation of the exhibits is planned to avoid repetition of exhibits 

 at an elementary school during the years any one child is in attend- 

 ance. Repetition may occur, however, as a result of emergency sub- 

 stitutions for exhibits stolen or destroyed in schools and for those 

 removed from circulation for repair. In 1957 one exhibit (broad- 

 winged hawk) was stolen from a school, and thirty exhibits were 

 temporarily withdrawn from circulation because of glass breakage 

 or (in four) damage to the installation. 



Nine new exhibits that had been almost completed by Preparator 

 Albert J. PYanzen before his death in October were finished in De- 

 cember and installed in portable cases. Four are duplicates of exhib- 

 its completed in 1956 — one identifies squirrels found in and near 

 Chicago (flying squirrel, fox squirrel, gray squirrel, and red squirrel) 

 and three are concerned with ground-squirrels (chipmunk, striped 

 gopher, and gray gopher). The five other new exhibits contrast a 

 cultivated blueberry (Burlington) with a low-bush blueberry com- 

 mon in our area. Workshop repairs of cases and installations were 

 made on 506 exhibits. 



No other museum makes available to its community a lending 

 service of such magnitude as that offered by this Museum through 

 Harris Extension. Over the years many museum representatives 



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