XOTES 



511 



histoi'v of the Aiuoiicaii Ornitlu)lo>;ists' 

 Union. This organization may almost 

 be looked upon as one of the collatorai 

 branches of the American Museum, having 

 been born in the Museum in 1883, liavinjr 

 drawn one fourth of ail its oflicers from tlic 

 Museum's staff, and having- licld one tliird 

 of all its meetinijs witiiiii the Museum's 

 walls. The thirty-sixth annual mt>ctin<;- of 

 the I'nion will mark the twelfth to be held 

 in the American Museum. 



Dr. Clark Wis.sler, curator of antliroiml- 

 ogy at the American Museum, spent July as 

 the guest of Dr. W. T. ^lills, state archaeol- 

 ogist of Ohio, who is making an archaeologi- 

 cal survey of the famous Flint Ridge district 

 between Columbus and Zanesville. Tlint 

 Ridge is an outcrop of flint-bearing lime- 

 stone extending east and west for ten or 

 more miles. The entire surface of the ridge 

 is covered with pits dug by prehistoric 

 miners while searching for flint suitable for 

 making implements. This is one of the most 

 remarkable prehistoric flint workings known 

 in America and perhaps in the world. Ad- 

 jacent to the ridge are large accumulations 

 of flint chips or fragments, struck off from 

 larger pieces in the shaping of arrowheads 

 or other articles. These deposits in some 

 cases reach a depth of fifteen feet and the 

 material is now being utilized for road 

 building in the vicinity. Scattered along 

 the small streams whose sources lie in Flint 

 Ridge, broken stone implements made of 

 flint taken from the pits on the ridge, to- 

 gether with fragments of pottery and bone, 

 mark former Indian village and camp sites. 



Dr. Wissler was occupied during the re- 

 mainder of the summer in a reconnaissance 

 of southeastern Indiana, with a view to 

 determining how far westward the Ohio 

 mound area extends, in order to supplement 

 the very full and accurate map of mounds 

 and earthworks which Dr. Mills has prepared 

 for the state of Ohio. For this purpose all 

 the counties of southeastern Indiana were 

 visited and the situation and character of 

 the earthworks mapped. A nund)er of very 

 important sites were located for future ex- 

 ploration by the Museum. 



The present year has been a period of 

 great activity in wooden ship building. In 

 May, according to the report of the United 

 States Shipping Board, an average of one 



ship a day was laun<dii'(l. Duriiiy tlu' first 

 seventeen days of that month (id.dOd tons 

 were added to tlic Ainerican meicliant ma- 

 i-in(\ On a rccoid-lircakiiiy day four 

 launchings wcic n'l.oitcd, totaling 14,;')00 

 tons. On the l''ourtli of duly, fifty-two ships 

 were launched throughout the United States. 

 For the most part these wooden ships are 

 built of lir or part lir, and more than one 

 half of \\\o total runnbei- launched are pro- 

 (IucimI by the shijiyards of Oregon and 

 Wasliitigtoii. 



A TiiiKU edition of Men of the Old Stone 

 A(/c. by Henry Fairfield Osborn, was issued 

 from the press of Charles Scribner's Sons on 

 September 18. This edition, which is in less 

 expensive form than the others, brings the 

 whole issue above the ten thousand mark. 

 The new volume includes additional illustra- 

 tions and appendixes bearing upon palaeo- 

 lithic implements of northern Africa and 

 Spain. Arrangements have been made by 

 the same publishers to bring out an edition 

 in French of Professor Osborn's work on 

 TJic Origin and Evolution of Life. 



Captain Ralph Sanger, of the American 

 aviation service, met his death the latter 

 part of September in a flying accident in 

 France. A cable to Mitchel Field, Mineola, 

 indicates that the accident occurred in a 

 training field many miles behind the lines. 

 Captain Saliger was a son-in-law of Presi- 

 dent Henry Fairfield Osborn of the Ameri- 

 can Museum. He was graduated from Har- 

 vard University in 1904. After war was 

 declared he went to Plattsburg and received 

 a commission as captain of infantry. Later 

 he was sent to the aviation camp at Dallas, 

 Texas, where he showed peculiar adaptabil- 

 ity for air service, so that when he was 

 transferred to Mitchel Field he was recog- 

 nized as one of the most promising aviation 

 commanders in America. Captain Sanger's 

 wife, who was Miss Virginia Sturges Osborn, 

 is serving as a nurse in France. 



Dk. Thorild Wulff, Swedish botanist 

 and geologist, after accomplishing a valuable 

 piece of scientific work along the coast of 

 northwest Greenland in the spring of 1917, 

 died on the homeward trip. It is rei)orted 

 that he continued work to the last, dictating 

 to his comi)anion, Lauge Koch, a survey of 

 the vegetation about Peabody Bay. The 

 party, whicdi was under the leadership of Mr. 



