THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



In February one of the daily newspapers of the city instituted 

 a prize contest among the children of the public schools for essays 

 upon the museums, parks and other features of the city. This 

 Museum joined heartily in that enterprise by means of lectures 

 offered to the school children who might be competing for the 

 prizes or who might for other reasons be interested especially in 

 the topics proposed. The programme of lectures was as follows : 



March 4. — "The American Museum of Natural History," by 

 Mr. Harlan I. Smith. 



March 11.— "The Parks of New York City," by Mr. L. P. 

 Gratacap. 



March 18. — " What New York has Done for the Children," by 

 Mr. W. H. ToLMAN. 



March 25. — "Points of Historic Interest in New York City," 

 by Professor Albert S. Bickmore. 



So great was the interest manifested in this plan that the re- 

 sponse to the first invitation, which was general, brought more 

 than 5,700 school children to the Museum on the afternoon of 

 March 4, most of whom had note books with them for the purpose 

 of carrying away what information might be obtained. Less 

 than one-third of the number could be accommodated in the 

 lecture halls of the building, so that it was necessary to repeat 

 the lecture by Mr. Smith on Tuesday, March 1 5 . Admittance to 

 the later lectures was by ticket, obtained on application. The 

 crowd that could not gain entrance to the hall on the first day 

 was divided into squads, which were addressed in the exhibition 

 halls by several members of the scientific staff of the Museum. 

 More than 14,000 school children, accompanied by their teachers, 

 attended the special lectures or studied the collections at the 

 Museum between January 1 5 and March 1 5 of the present year. 



The Department of Mammalogy and Ornithology has recently 

 received a considerable number of important additions. These 

 include specimens for mounting of the Mountain Caribou and 

 Mountain Goat from the Selkirk Mountains of British Columbia, 

 presented by Messrs. Madison Grant and C. A. Moore; a large 

 series of Mule Deer, and many small mammals, from Lower Cali- 



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