SECRETARY’S REPORT 37 
From March 12 to 15, 1958, Ronald Tavares, exhibits worker, 
visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Museum of the City of 
New York; the Peabody Museum of Salem; and the Boston Fine 
Arts Museum of Massachusetts. He was especially interested in 
those exhibits illustrating the development and history of water- 
craft. 
William L. Brown, chief zoological exhibits specialist, inspected the 
tanning of a large elephant hide at Waynesboro, Va., on several days 
during the month of October 1957. 
From October 8 to 11, 1957, Watson M. Perrygo, zoological ex- 
hibits worker, visited New York City and Philadelphia where he 
investigated various plastic-manufacturing companies in order to 
produce on a large scale museum accessories such as leaves, vines, 
branches, grass, and other botanical objects. In November 1957 he 
spent 3 days with George Young, chief of the exhibition department 
at Kansas University Natural History Museum. Here he had an 
opportunity to study methods of making plastic exhibition accessories 
by hydraulic press. 
John C. Lingebach, zoological exhibits worker, spent several days 
in April 1958 collecting a variety of mammals for the exhibits now 
under construction in the mammal hall. Most of Mr. Lingebach’s 
collecting on this trip and again in May was in the vicinity of 
Wardensville, Yellow Springs, North Mountain, and Capon Springs, 
W. Va. 
EXHIBITIONS 
During the fifth year of the continuing program for the moderni- 
zation of exhibits at the Smithsonian Institution, $605,000 was made 
available by congressional appropriation for selected exhibition halls. 
Construction bids were received in February 1958 for the halls de- 
voted to fossil invertebrates and fossil cold-blooded vertebrates 
(fishes, amphibians, and reptiles), in June 1958 for North American 
archeology, and in June 1958 for the hall of agriculture to be located 
in the east-south range of the Arts and Industries building. Con- 
struction work for the textiles hall was commenced in September 
1st: 
The new hall of health was opened to the public on the evening of 
November 2, 1957, in ceremonies featuring addresses by Dr. John D. 
Porterfield, Deputy Surgeon General of the Public Health Service, 
Dr. Fred L. Soper, Director of the Pan American Sanitary Bureau, 
and Dr. Leonard Carmichael, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institu- 
tion. “Through the Ages, Man’s Knowledge of His Body” is the 
theme of this hall, which contrasts old ideas with present-day know]- 
edge of human anatomy and physiology. Emphasis is placed on 
health rather than disease, and modern exhibit techniques are utilized 
