94 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1915. 



ART ROOM. 



Mrs. Charles D. Walcott has added to the collection of works on 

 art an exceptionally valuable loan, consisting of nine magnificent 

 volumes on Japanese art, fully illustrated in color. Mrs. Walcott 

 has also deposited the architectural publications, numbering 394 

 volumes, and parts of serial publications which formed the library of 

 her brother, George Vaux, an architect of prominence in the city of 

 Philadelphia. 



EMPLOYEES' LIBRARY. 



The employees' library has also received a contribution from Mrs. 

 Walcott by the deposit of a collection of popular works, numbering 

 145 volumes. 



NEW STEEL STACKS. 



The work on the new steel stacks for the books belonging to the 

 libraries of the Government bureaus under the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion has been continued, and at the close of the year this work is 

 nearly completed. With the passage of the appropriation bills in 

 August, 1914, the additional sum oi $10,000 became available, and 

 immediately an order w^as issued for the erection of as much of the 

 second half of the stacks in the west end of the main hall as the 

 money available would permit. Those in the east end were completed 

 in August, and the moving of the library of the Bureau of American 

 Ethnology to its new quarters was accomplished within a very short 

 time. The old wooden galleries in the Avest end were then removed, 

 and this part of the hall was turned over to the contractors for the 

 erection of stacks. Congress having appropriated an additional sum 

 of $6,500 during the last session, the steel stacks were practically 

 finished at the close of the year. 



The libraries of the Govermnent bureaus under the Institution have 

 heretofore been cared for in the bureau offices and wherever there was 

 space for shelving. Proper classification and arrangement were im- 

 possible, owing to lack of s]Dace, and much time was lost in looking for 

 references. The new stacks have a capacity of 100,000 volumes, and 

 make it possible for the first time to bring all publications relating to 

 one subject together, so that each is available for consultation. 



UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



It seems desirable, after a period of a third of a century, to briefly 

 review the growth and progress that have been made in the Museum 

 library. The formation of a working library in the National 

 Museum in 1881 was largely due to the increased activity in investi- 



