NO. I ETHNOGEOGRAPHIC BOARD BENNETT 63 



To be sure, most of these lists and reports were prepared for the use 

 of Government military and war agencies, and widespread distri- 

 bution was discouraged by the FBI. which tried to insist on limiting 

 distribution to official requests. 



The Board's distribution service was well developed in the local 

 sense, and interested agencies received everything that they could 

 utilize. However, it is unfortunate that there was so little to distribute. 

 Thirty-five items is certainly no sample of the scholarly resources 

 of this country. 



REPORTS 



Besides furnishing information of the kind described and distribut- 

 ing prepared mimeographed materials, the Board undertook certain as- 

 signments of a larger scale which called for the preparation of 

 reports. The dual function of the Ethnogeographic Board, to answer 

 and to sell, is again reflected here. Some reports were prepared on 

 the basis of written requests from the Government agencies, and 

 others were prepared by the Board on its own initiative and then 

 presented to the agencies. Behind this service was the concept that 

 while exigency called for brief and hurried answers, many of the 

 problems were worthy of fuller and more exact treatment and should, 

 consequently, be farmed out to scholars. Unfortunately this sound 

 principle was seldom put into practice. 



Some of the longer reports were prepared on the basis of written 

 directives. Both the Army and Navy Intelligence presented outlines 

 of the types of information which they desired for various regions, 

 and the Bureau of ^ledicine and Surgery did the same. They are 

 heavily weighted on information of a strictly military nature and 

 take no account of the abilities and limitations of scholars. (See 

 samples of these outlines in Appendix D.) Undoubtedly many more 

 reports could have been handled if the division of labor had been 

 adequately defined. During the first year and a half, 37 reports were 

 completed. These fall rather clearly into four categories. 



I. STRATEGIC AREAS 



Thirteen items are described in one of the Director's statements 

 as "confidential reports on areas of strategic importance." These 

 refer to the Bering Strait region, Seward Peninsula, St. Lawrence 

 and Nunivak Islands, Alaska, and Kamchatka; the eastern Nether- 



