22 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1945 



actually evaluated, and the Museum staff may be justly proud of 

 its part in the war effort, which now has ended so victoriously. 



COLLECTIONS 



The Museum collections were increased during the year by 232,822 

 specimens, which were included in 1,562 separate lots. The five de- 

 partments registered specimens received as follows: Anthropology, 

 6,642; biology, 197,462; geology, 23,770; engineering and industries, 

 3,199; history, 1,749. Most of the accessions were acquired as gifts 

 from individuals or as transfers of specimens by Government de- 

 partments. The complete report on the Museum, published as a 

 separate document, includes a detailed list of the year's accessions, 

 but the more important are summarized below. Catalog entries in 

 all departments now exceed 18,000,000. 



Anthropology. — The largest lot of archeological material acces- 

 sioned during the year consisted of 5,677 specimens excavated from 

 Indian village sites in Scott and Lane Counties, Kans., in 1939 by 

 Associate Curator Waldo R. Wedel. Other Kansas material included 

 343 archeological specimens from the collection of the late Dr. Nor- 

 man L. Roberts, of Topeka. Specimens of interest from out of the 

 country included 2 painted Neolithic jars from China and 10 Nasca 

 and Early Chimu vessels from Peru. In the field of ethnology, the 

 year's accessions came especially from the Northwest Pacific coast 

 and Alaska, Micronesia, Polynesia, Solomon Islands, New Guinea, 

 Burma, China, Ecuador (Jivaro Indians), and North America (sev- 

 eral Indian tribes), many of them through the interest and efforts of 

 men in the armed services. An important contribution to the Micro- 

 nesian collection was a large model outrigger canoe (baurua) from 

 Tarawa in the Gilbert Islands. Another interesting addition was a 

 royal Hawaiian cape (a7iuula), fully feathered with black and yellow 

 feathers of the oo bird and red feathers of the iiwi. An Arab costume 

 presented to Gen. H. H. Arnold by the King of Saudi Arabia was lent 

 to the Museum by General Arnold. The section of period art and 

 textiles received through deposit from the Smithsonian Institution 

 the valuable and well-known Arthur Michael collection of early Amer- 

 ican silver, representing the work of 121 silversmiths of the Colonial 

 and Federal periods (1675-1850), among whom are John Coney and 

 Paul Revere. This outstanding bequest was placed on exhibition in 

 the lobby of the Natural History Building. Notable gifts to the di- 

 vision of physical anthropology included 22 skeletons from Amchitka 

 Island, Aleutians, 35 embryological specimens, and the well-known 

 skull of Homo novusmundus found near Folsom, N. Mex., in 1935. 



