Milestones 55 



every sort of object to be jammed into tbe exhibition cases. The 

 Museum still, even at this date, accepted the care of material of 

 every sort. The result was a fearful hodge-podge of ill-cared and 

 often repulsive exhibits which belonged by right in a medical school 

 or some repository other than a public exhibition. 



At about this time it likewise became evident that the fields of 

 the Museum in Boston and the University Museum in Cambridge 

 were both being cultivated in much the same way. This should 

 never have been allowed to occur, but the group of young men who 

 began to take their places on the Council, from fifteen to twenty 

 years ago, were faced with a fact and not a theory, and "taking the 

 bull by the horns," the Society's Museum, and, indeed, the Society 

 itself, was completely reorganized. The Boston organization devoted 

 itself entirely to the exhibition and study of the geology, fauna, 

 and flora of New England while the Museum in Cambridge ac- 

 cepted the care of the general exotic collections and transferred its 

 New England material to Boston. 



After this difficult and laborious task was accomplished, the 

 modernization of the Boston Museum began, and it is to-day a cry- 

 ing shame that so large a part of the intelligent public of Boston does 

 not realize that they have a Museum which, considering the means 

 available, is a gem and an asset of which the City should be highly 

 proud. Although starved and neglected, it is now clean, attractive, 

 well labelled, and astonishingly rich in specimens of unique value. 



We have reason to believe that a misapprehension exists in the 

 public mind in regard to the sources of our financial support. Many 

 people think that our Museum is supported by State funds. Such 

 is not the case. The land on which our Museum stands was kindly 

 granted by the State in 1860, but our Museum has been maintained 

 through the generosity of a comparatively small number of public- 



