80 



THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



photographs of the essential stages in the 

 development of plants and animals, and of 

 carefully labeled diagrams, thus making a 

 complex subject remarkably clear. Follow- 

 ing this film there was exhibited another 

 showing the growth of the house fly and its 

 relation to disease. 



Mr. H. E. Anthony will spend the spring 

 months in Cuba, in an effort to secure fossil 

 mammal material for comparison with the 

 specimens recently brought back from Porto 

 Eico. The unexpected discovery of a rather 

 extensive fossil mammalian fauna in Porto 

 Rico points suggestively to the possibility of 

 similar faunas on the adjacent islands, and 

 of important results that might come from 

 correlating the island faunas. It is probable 

 that most of the work in (hiba will be done 

 on the eastern end of the island. 



Miss Ann E. Thomas represented the 

 American Museum of Natural History at the 

 meeting of the New York State Science 

 Teachers' Association at Syracuse, Decem- 

 ber 27-29. She addressed the biology sec- 

 tion on the cooperation that exists between 

 the American Museum and the public schools 

 of New York City in the teaching of natural 

 science. 



Under the terms of the will of James 

 Gaunt, an annual member of the American 

 Museum of Natural History, the institution 

 is designated as residuary legatee of one 

 half of his estate. 



During the session of the American Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science re- 

 cently held in New York City, the meetings 

 of the Section of Anthropology and Psychol- 

 ogy convened at the American Museum, also 

 those of the American Anthropological As- 

 sociation, the American Eolk-Lore Society, 

 the Vertebrate Section of the Palaeontologi- 

 cal Society, and the Entomological Society. 

 On December 27, Professor T. D. A. Cocke- 

 rell, retiring president of the Entomological 

 Society of America, gave an address at the 

 Museum on "Fossil Insects." On December 

 28, Dr. A. A. Noyes, of the Massachusetts 

 Institute of Technology, addressed a meet- 

 ing of the American Chemical Association in 

 the auditorium of the Museum on "Nitrogen 



and Preparedness." Following this address 

 a reception was held in the hall of the age 

 of man by the various chemical societies 

 represented at the meetings. On December 

 29, Professor Frederic P. Gay gave an ad- 

 dress on "Specialization and Research in the 

 Medical Sciences" before the Section of 

 Physiology and Experimental Medicine and 

 the Society of American Bacteriologists. 

 There was also held a symposium on cancer 

 and its control. 



During January Dr. Robert H. Lowie 

 ga\e four lectures on ethnology at the Mu- 

 seum. The object of the course was to define 

 culture. The subjects considered at the 

 successive lectures were "Culture and Psy- 

 chology," "Culture and Race," "Culture and 

 Environment," and "Determinants of Cul- 

 ture." 



The American Scenic and Historic Preser- 

 vation Society, jointly with the American 

 Museum of Natural History, on January 10, 

 held exercises signalizing the establishment 

 of the National Park Service of the United 

 States. The speaker of the evening was the 

 Honorable Robert Sterling Yard, of the Na- 

 tional Park Service, Department of the In- 

 terior, who gave an illustrated address on 

 our national parks and national monuments. 



The supervisors of the national parks of 

 the United States, who had been called from 

 the West for a conference in Washington, 

 visited New York City January 9 and 10. 

 They were entertained at luncheon at the 

 American Museum of Natural History, by 

 Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn, January 

 10. Following the luncheon, they made a 

 tour of the Museum, paying particular atten- 

 tion to the habitat groups, the halls of verte- 

 l)rate palaeontology, and the hall of forestry. 

 Arrangements were made for securing from 

 the supervisors a series of tree portraits rep- 

 resentative of the national parks. Those 

 jiresent were Major Amos Alfred Fries, Yel- 

 lowstone Park; Mr. Walter Fry, Sequoia 

 and General Grant parks; Mr. George Estyn 

 Goodwin, Crater Lake Park; Mr. Washing- 

 ton B. Lewis, Yosemite Park; Mr. S. F. 

 Ralston, Glacier Park ; Mr. Thomas Rickner, 

 Mesa Verde Park; Mr. L. Claude Way, Estes 

 Park; and Mr. W. A. Welch, engineer of the 

 Palisades Interstate Park Commission. 



