52 EEPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1920. 



The industrial interests of the country have been and are deeply 

 interested in the proper development of the department of arts 

 and industries, but under present conditions it has been impossible 

 for the Museum to do justice even to one single subject. The object 

 of this department is to bring the industrial interests of the country 

 in direct contact with examples of the best class of workmanship 

 in the various crafts. Its purposes are wholly practical, and already 

 many crafts not only look to the Museum for information but con- 

 tribute liberally in furnishing material for exhibition, funds for 

 construction of models, etc. Some of the subjects already represented 

 here are textiles, art textiles, medicine, foods, miscellaneous animal 

 and vegetable products, mineral technology, land and aerial trans- 

 portation, naval architecture, metrology, mechanical transmission of 

 intelligence, mechanical and electrical inventions, firearms, musical 

 instruments, pottery, glass, metal work, and graphic arts, the latter 

 being transferred from the department of anthropology at the close 

 of June 30, 1920. 



The available funds of the Museum not being sufficient to provide 

 separate staff officers for each section or division, these various ac- 

 tivities have had of necessity to be placed in certain instances under 

 those curators in other lines best qualified to also handle the subjects. 

 Thus, for instance, for administrative purposes only the division of 

 medicine is under the general supervision of Mr. F. L. Lewton, who 

 is the curator of textiles; and Dr. Walter Hough of the department 

 of anthropology, besides looking after the collections of his own par- 

 ticular division of ethnology, gives general oversight to various 

 other collections where there is no paid staff, particularly the art 

 textiles, ceramics, musical instruments, and the period costumes 

 collection. 



The sundry civil act for the fiscal year 1921 carries a small appro- 

 priation for the National Gallery of Art. For economic reasons 

 the gallery has up to now been administered as an integral part of 

 the Museum, the scientific and administrative staffs of which have 

 cared for the gallery in addition to their own regular Museum 

 duties. This appropriation will permit of the gallery being separated 

 from the Museum on July 1, 1920, and organized as an independent 

 bureau under the Smithsonian Institution, and to it will be trans- 

 ferred the fine art collections of the Museum which have heretofore 

 been administered under the curator of the National Gallery of 

 Art. The gallery will for the present, however, continue to be housed 

 in the Natural History Building of the Museum. 



Much is expected of the movement for the reclassification of the 

 salaries of the Government employees in the District of Columbia. 

 The Congressional Joint Commission on Reclassification of Salaries 



