170 IN BRIGHTEST AFRICA 
else, for that matter—that the principles I had worked 
out for taxidermy, for the cement gun, and for the 
camera might be applied to the mechanical devices 
of warfare. 
But work began with an order from the Govern- 
ment for a lot of Akeley cameras. A call from the 
Signal Corps of the War Department asking me to 
bring them down took me to Washington shortly after 
war was declared, with the result that I accepted a 
contract whereby the entire output of the camera shop 
was turned over to the United States Government. 
Soon after I became a Specialist on Mechanical 
Devices and Optical Equipment in the Division of 
Investigation, Research, and Development of the 
Engineer Corps. My chief was Major O. B. Zimmer- 
man, who thirty years before had been my student in 
Milwaukee. He had wanted to become a taxidermist, 
but in those days taxidermy seemed a mighty poor 
game and J did my best to dissuade him from any 
such mad career. His wisdom in following my ad- 
vice is proved by the fact that when the war broke 
out he was in Belgium as one of the leading engineers 
for the International Harvester Company. I had a 
desk in Major Zimmerman’s office, but my actual 
work was done in the camera shop in New York, in 
the American Museum of Natural History, and in 
various laboratories. At least once each week I rode 
back and forth from Washington to New York. My 
duties were those of a consulting engineer, but they 
were much varied, for we had several things under 
way all the time. Wherever a problem, mechanical 
