MUSEUM NOTES 



Since the last issue of the Journal the fol- 

 lowing persons have been elected to member- 

 ship in the Museum: 



Life Members, Messrs. S. C. Pirie, 

 Charles T. Ramsden and Charles B. 

 Webster ; 



Sustaining Members, Dr. Edwin Beer and 

 Mr. Harold C. Whitman; 



Annual Members, Mrs. Albert Winsten, 

 Misses Helen Louise Johnson, Marguer- 

 ite T. Lee, Caroline Lexow and Chris- 

 tina Muendel and Messrs. Clinton G. 

 Abbott, Andrew K. Ackerman, William C. 

 Anderson, Alfred L. Baker, S. Hinman 

 Bird, M. C. Bouvier, Oscar Falk, H. 

 Lloyd Folsom, E. Howard-Martin, Louis 

 M. Josephthal, Reid A. Kathan, Edward 

 V. Killeen, J. M. Klein, Eben B. Knowx- 

 TON, John G. Livingston, Daniel Alden 

 Loring, Jr., Robert Edgar McAllister, 

 Irving E. Raymond, August Saril, Gus- 

 TAVE H. Schiff, Max Schling, David 

 Schwab, Robert R. Sizer, Fred Sternberg, 

 Julius Sternfeld, John Francis Strauss, 

 Maurice J. Strauss, H. M. Swetland, T. B. 

 Wagner, Milton H. Wallenstein, Leo 

 Wallerstein, William De H. Washington, 

 John Caldwell Welwood and Jacob 

 Wertheim. 



A conference on the Piltdown skull and 

 the origin of man was held by the Section of 

 Biology, New York Academy of Sciences on 

 January 12. Professor Osborn reviewed the 

 succession of the early human types showing 

 their relations to the alternating advances 

 and retreats of the great continental glacier 

 in Europe. Dr. J. Leon Williams then sum- 

 marized the present knowledge of the already 

 famous Piltdown skull. He was inclined to 

 side with Professor Keith's reconstruction of 

 the skull, which implies a high brain volume. 

 Dr. Robert Broom on the other hand defended 

 Smith Woodward's reconstruction which as- 

 signs a low brain volume to this very old type. 

 The discussion brought out the fact that the 

 lower jaw found with this skull is more like 

 that of an orang-utan, while the skull frag- 

 ments are typically human. Dr. W. K. 

 Gregory gave a series of views showing the 

 base of the cranium in various families of 

 Primates including man. He emphasized the 

 idea that whether the Piltdown man had a 

 large brain or a small brain the evidence for 



man's relationship with the old world mon- 

 keys and apes was long since made conclusive 

 and new lines of evidence are continually 

 coming to light. He showed that the de- 

 tailed characters at the base of the skull in 

 man agree fundamentally with those of the 

 Old World Primates. 



Dr. Williams' interesting collection of casts 

 of human and prehuman skulls were exhib- 

 ited. This collection brings together casts 

 of all the famous fossil skulls of Europe 

 and illustrates the stages leading from the 

 apelike Pithecanthropus through the Ne- 

 anderthal stage with low brows and retreat- 

 ing forehead and sloping chin up to the Cro- 

 Magnon or low palaeolithic stage with highly 

 developed brain case and well-formed chin. 

 This collection will be on view for a short 

 time in the hall of fossil mammals. 



Mr. and Mrs. Paul J. Sachs have estab- 

 lished a fund to be known officially as the 

 Angelo Heilprin Exploring Fund. The money 

 is given in memory of Angelo Heilprin and is 

 to be applied each year to any exploring pur- 

 pose the Museum authorities deem fitting. 



Dr. Clark Wissler, curator of the de- 

 partment of anthropology, was elected vice- 

 president of Section H of the American Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science at 

 the Atlanta meeting in December. 



Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn 

 will deliver the Hitchcock lectures at the 

 University of California from February 16 

 to 20 inclusive. The subject of the series 

 will be the "Antiquity of Man." 



Mr. Charles R. Knight will hold during 

 the month of February, a special exhibition 

 of his work in the west assembly hall of the 

 Museum. The sculptures and paintings 

 exhibited will include not only examples of 

 his restorations of extinct animals and de- 

 signs for mural decorations for the hall of 

 fossil vertebrates in the Museum, but also 

 many representative illustrations of his work 

 as a sculptor and painter of modern animals. 

 Various bronzes and canvases belonging 

 to Mrs. J. P. Morgan, Mrs. E. H. Harriman, 

 Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn and others 

 have been especially loaned for the exhibit. 



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