Reprinted in part from the Proceedings of the American Association of Museums 



Vol. IV, IQIO 



THE PALEOBOTANICAL COLLECTIONS OF THE NEW 

 YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN 



Introduction 



The New York Botanical Garden, as far as I am informed, is the 

 only institution in America in which paleobotany has been developed 

 as a distinct and separate museum feature, accompanied by courses 

 of instruction in the subject. 



Johns Hopkins University offers a full course in paleobotany, 

 recognizing it as coordinate with other branches of paleontology; but 

 the material available for study purposes is not very extensive or 

 comprehensive and is, for the most part, arranged to illustrate strati- 

 graphic sequence rather than biologic significance. 



The United States National Museum maintains a section devoted 

 exclusively to fossil plants, in connection with its general paleonto- 

 logical collections, with two custodians who have charge, respect- 

 ively, of paleozoic and post-paleozoic plants ; but the development of 

 the subject is essentially along geologic lines, in connection with 

 the work of the United States Geological Survey. 



In all other institutions of which I have any knowledge fossil 

 plants appear to be regarded only as incidental features of strati- 

 graphic or paleontologic collections. 



The New York Botanical Garden, alone among its sister institutions, 

 recognizes paleobotany as coordinate with and as the phylogenetic 

 and logical basis of systematic botany, and it has occurred to me that 

 an account of the history, arrangement, and development of the col- 

 lections in accordance with this point of view might be of interest. 



