30 ANTHROPOLOGICAL SURVEY IN ALASKA [eth. ann. 46 



Nelson, and Murdoch ; to the separate pieces of scientific work by men 

 such as Gordon and Jennes; and to Jochelson and Bogoras of the 

 Jesup exploring expedition of the American Museum. 



As a result of all these contributions, it may be said that there has 

 been established a fair cultural and linguistic knowledge of the Aleut/ 

 the Eskimo, and the Chukchee, not to speak of the Tlingit, considera- 

 tion of which seems more naturally to fall with that of the Indians 

 of the northwest coast. 



There are also numerous though often very imperfect and occa- 

 sionally rather contradictory notes on the physical status of these 

 peoples, and some valuable cultural and even skeletal collections were 

 made. Since 1912 we possess also a good series of measurements on 

 the St. Lawrence Island natives, together with valuable cranial ma- 

 terial from that locality, made, under the direction of the writer, by 

 Riley D. Moore, at that time aide in the Division of Physical 

 Anthropology in the United States National Museum. 



The need of a further systematic archeological and somatologies! 

 research in this important part of the world was long since felt, and 

 several propositions were made in this line to the National Research 

 Council (Hrdlicka) and to the Smithsonian Institution (Hough, 

 Hrdlicka) ; but nothing came of these until the early part of 1926, 

 when, a little money becoming available, the writer was intrusted 

 by the Bureau of American Ethnology with the making of an exten- 

 sive preliminary survey of Alaska. The objects of the trip were, 

 in brief, to ascertain as much as possible about the surviving Indians 

 and Eskimos; to trace all indications of old settlements and migra- 

 tions ; and to collect such skeletal and archeological material as might 

 be of importance. 



The trip occupied approximately four months, from the latter 

 part of May to the latter part' of September, affording a full season 

 in Alaska. It began with the inside trip from Vancouver to Juneau, 

 where at several of the stopping places groups of the northwest coast 

 Indians were observed. At Juneau examination was made of the 

 valuable archeological collections in the local museum. After this 

 followed a trip with several stops along the gulf, a railroad trip with 

 some stops to Fairbanks, a return trip to Nenana, a boat trip on the 

 Tanana to the Yukon, and then, with little boats of various sorts, a 

 trip with many stops for about 900 miles down the Yukon. This 

 in turn was followed by a side trip in Norton Sound, after which 

 transportation was secured to the island of St. Michael and to Nome. 

 From Nome, after some work in the vicinity, the revenue cutter Bear 

 took the writer to the St. Lawrence and Diomede Islands, to Cape 

 Wales, and thence from place to place of scientific interest up to 

 Barrow. On the return a number of the more important places, 



