gS SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 10/ 



funds wtuc ample. However, tlie Board was satisfied to make sug- 

 gestions to tlie Directorate, which were usually impractical for 

 execution. 



The Sponsors accepted this situation. Although fully informed of 

 the activities of the Directorate and the Board, they made no sug- 

 gestions or comments on the fact that the full potential of academic 

 resources was not being tapped. Little use was made of the Board 

 to bring the varied activities of the Sponsors' committees to the at- 

 tention of the Government agencies, although the Board was admit- 

 tedly in an excellent position to do this. Furthermore, the Sponsors 

 and their organizations could have stimulated the production of many 

 useful reports and summaries for the Board to distribute effectively. 

 Perhaps the position of being a joint committee of three councils 

 serves to trisect rather than triple support. 



If the Ethnogeographic Board's experience is at all typical, the 

 scholars and academic institutions are not too aware of their social 

 responsibility. The few scholars who made use of the Board were 

 already intimately involved in the organization. The Strategic Bul- 

 letins of Oceania, and the Cross-Cultural Survey files, both under 

 the direction of George Peter Murdock, were given wide circulation 

 and increased utilization through the Board. Was Dr. Murdock the 

 only scholar in the country with valuable area materials? Could the 

 Board have obtained more reports and materials for its purposes? 

 The difficulties were enormous. Many scholars were in the armed 

 services ; others were busy to an extreme. Both scholars and insti- 

 tutions were apathetic about organizing materials on their own ini- 

 tiative. In spite of all this the situation was not impossible. Most 

 of the materials which the board distributed had been prepared either 

 before it came into existence or completely independently. If the 

 Smithsonian Institution, the Institute of Human Relations, and the 

 National Research Council committees had materials which the Board 

 considered worth while, surely other institutions and academic groups 

 in the country had the same. A well-worded letter might have revealed 

 this. 



A war situation creates confusion and overwork, but it also provides 

 a motive for production unequaled by any crisis in peacetime. In war- 

 time, the scholars would be apt to produce the requested report first 

 and question its legitimacy afterward. In peacetime, the same scholars 

 would have to be convinced of the necessity of the report and probably 

 would be loathe to donate their services unless especially interested in 

 the particular project. The Ethnogeographic Board had the prestige 

 of its Sponsors and sufficient resources to allow for travel and secre- 



