MARINE SCIENCE 23 
(The statement follows :) 
UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI, 
THE Marine LABORATORY, 
Virginia Key, Miami, Fla., March 7, 1961. 
‘Senator Warren Magnuson, 
Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 
Dear Senator Macnuson: I regret that prior commitments makes it impos- 
sible for me to attend the hearings of your committee but I should like to submit 
the following statement, inasmuch as, in the opinion of both my colleagues and 
myself, your bill (S. 901) is an extremely important one. 
My name is Frederick George Walton Smith. I was awarded the degree of 
doctor of philosophy in the University of London, England, in 1934. I also hold 
the degrees of B. Sc. and A.R.C.S. My entire career has been devoted to research 
and teaching in biological and physical oceanography. At present I am direc- 
tor of the Institute of Marine Science (The Marine Laboratory) of the Univer- 
sity of Miami, which I had the honor of establishing in 1943. Although this 
laboratory is unique in being the only tropical marine research, institution in 
the United States many of its problems are common to all marine research 
institutions and may be to a great extent solved by the passage of your bill. 
I am also a vice president of the International Oceanographic Foundation. 
‘One of the objectives of this foundation is to provide funds from private sources 
for the support of research and teaching in oceanography. A second function is 
public education and dissemination of authoritative information regarding 
oceanography. This it does through its illustrated magazine Sea Frontiers, of 
which I am editor. 
I am sure there is no longer any need to stress the importance of oceanography 
to the national welfare since this has been well covered by the report of the 
Committee on Oceanography of the National Academy of Science. 
The ocean is our first line of defense. It is clear that a greater scientific 
understanding of oceanographic phenomena is vital to submarine navigation and 
to improve submarine attack, defense, and communication. 
The role of the oceans as a source of food has not yet become vital in our 
own country but, with a rapidly growing population both in the United States 
and throughout the world there must inevitably come a time when food from 
the sea will be a problem of the first magnitude. It is unthinkable that a coun- 
try such as ours should be allowed to fall behind other countries in preparing for 
that day. 
What is true of seafood is true of minerals to an even greater degree since the 
land sources of mineral wealth are not crops but are strictly capital in nature 
‘so that once used they have gone forever. 
There is hardly an aspect of our science today which is not to a greater or 
lesser extent dependent upon our knowledge of the sea. An example of this is 
meteorology. The ocean which absorbs and stores the greater part of the 
sun’s heat falling on this planet and which is the reservoir of our atmospheric 
moisture is a major part in the weather machine.’ Prediction and eventually the 
human eontrol of weather and destructive phenomena such as hurricanes are 
inescapably dependent upon our improved understanding of the ocean itself. 
Those of us who are trying to rescue oceanography from its past neglect are 
concerned with a shortage of trained scientists and of research ships, buildings, 
and scientific instruments. At Miami we need a 700-ton vessel and a 1,560-ton 
vessel properly designed for research. The only seagoing vessel we have at the 
_ moment was converted from a private yacht. Nevertheless we have secured 
the services of first rate marine architects and engineers and have developed 
an advanced design of twin-hulled research vessel, involving new principles 
and devices which will do much to modernize seagoing operations. ‘This prog- 
ress in design will enable a vessel to be built at considerable savings over the 
cost of a conventional hull, but the funds have not hitherto been available for 
this much needed development. 1 
Our present buildings including corridors, workshops, and storage have less 
than 35,000 feet of floor space. The scientific staff, teaching staff, technicians, 
and students oeeupying this space need additional classrooms and laboratories to 
provide approximately 34,000 square feet of extra floor space in order to operate 
effectively and to increase the student training program. At the moment the 
situation is so urgent that we are about to erect temporary buildings and quonset 
huts‘in order to relieve the serious overcrowding. These huts may be acceptable 
to scientists but in a tropical clim°*2 they are bad for delicate instruments. 
