APPENDIX 1 



Report on the United States National Museum 



Sm ; I have the honor to submit the following report on the condition 

 and operations of the United States National Museum for the fiscal 

 year ended June 30, 1953 : 



COLLECTIONS 



Specimens incorporated into the national collections totaled 1,607,911 

 (more than twice the number received last year) and were distributed 

 among the six departments as follows : Anthropology, 10,540 ; zoology, 

 211,677 ; botany, 82,984 ; geology, 1,275,140 ; engineering and industries, 

 2,008 ; and history, 25,562. The unusual increase is attributable chiefly 

 to the accessioning of a large number of small fossils, including 750,000 

 Permian invertebrates and 500,000 Arctic Foraminif era. Most of the 

 other accessions were acquired as gifts from individuals or as transfers 

 from Government departments and agencies. The Annual Report of 

 the Museum, published as a separate document, contains a detailed list 

 of the year's acquisitions, of which the more important are summarized 

 below. Catalog entries in all departments now total 34,764,250. 



Anthropology. — A collection of 315 chipped-stone artifacts, includ- 

 ing fluted projectile points and other man-made objects that suggest 

 a Paleo-Indian culture, from the Shoop site, Dauphin County, Pa., is 

 of particular interest. The Carnegie Institution of Washington, in 

 continuation of their generous cooperation, donated a collection of 

 potsherds representing type objects from excavated sites in the Maya 

 area. 



Through an exchange with the Denver Art Museum, the division of 

 ethnology acquired two ceremonial bundles that were formerly used 

 by northern Blackfoot Indians in the rites for tobacco planting. A 

 rare and valuable Chinese Lamaist robe, of dark blue silk and embel- 

 lished with over-all couching of braided silk and embroidery in metal- 

 lic gilt, was presented by Maj. Lee Hagood who had acquired it in 

 Shanghai in 1918. Objects recovered from historical sites of villages, 

 trading posts, and factories in Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New 

 York, and Massachusetts and other New England States were received 

 from various donors. Of outstanding interest and usefulness to the 

 collector and student of early American ceramics are 189 pieces of red- 

 ware, stoneware, and other types of New England folk pottery pre- 

 sented by Mrs. Lura Woodside Watkins. These pottery fragments 

 excavated from sites of New England potteries in existence between 



14 



