18 BEPOKT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1921.. 



There were acquired during the year 62 exhibition cases (50 steel 

 and 12 wooden), and 165 pieces of storage, laboratory and office fur- 

 niture. Of the exhibition cases, 12 were made in the Museum, the 

 other 50 transferred to the Museum by the Department of the In- 

 terior, having been used at the Panama-Pacific International Ex- 

 position at San Francisco in 1915. 



Of the 165 pieces of storage, laboratory and office furniture. 96 

 pieces were manufactured in the Museum workshops and 69 were 

 purchased. It is becoming more and more the policy of the Museum 

 to manufacture its own furniture, as in most cases it can be done 

 more economically, owing to the difference in the cost of labor. 



At the close of the fiscal year, there were on hand 3,647 exhibition 

 cases and bases and 11,508 pieces of storage, laboratory and office 

 furniture. In addition to these, there were 46,650 wooden unit 

 drawers, 4,712 metal unit drawers, 1,047 wooden unit boxes, 224 

 double unit boxes, and 11.244 insect drawers; also 752 winged frames, 

 5,885 special drawers with paper bottoms, and 11,445 special drawers 

 with compo bottoms. 



COLLECTIONS. 



The total number of specimens acquired by the Museum during the 

 year was approximately 338,120. Received in 1,730 separate acces- 

 sions, they were classified and assigned as follows: Anthropology, 

 3,824; zoology, 196,077; botany, 55,436; geology, mineralogy, and 

 petrology, estimated, 21,772; paleontology, estimated, 50,000; textiles, 

 wood, medicine, foods, and other miscellaneous organic products, 

 943; mineral technology, 466; mechanical technolog}', 162; graphic 

 arts, 2,296 ; and history, 7,144. 



Additional material, to the extent of 794 lots, mainly geological, 

 was received for special examination and report. While this free de- 

 termination of material sent in from all parts of the countr^^ requires 

 considerable time on the part of specialists, it is not without advan- 

 tage to the Museum in furnishing occasional desirable specimens and 

 in recording new localities. 



About 25,000 specimens were sent out in exchange, for which the 

 Museum received much valuable material specially desired for the 

 collections. 



The distribution of specimens for educational work was broadened 

 this year to include objects from the department of anthropology. 

 Of the 6,000 specimens distributed as gifts in aid of education dur- 

 ing the period of this report, over 5,000 were comprised in classified 

 and labeled sets of specimens prepared for schools and colleges, 

 nearly 2,000 being ores and minerals. The other subjects represented 

 were rocks, rock weathering and soil formation, mollusks, marine in- 



