38 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1918. 



dependence is established drawing variously upon the. other groups 

 and linking them together. Thus to build up a deficiency in any one 

 specific direction it often becomes necessary to carry the work of 

 reconstruction far afield. 



As applied to mineral derivatives, the question of interrelationship 

 has been a subject of special study in the division of mineral tech- 

 nology from the time of its establishment, and it was felt from the 

 outset that here lay the chief opportunity to render service. When 

 the country's deficiency in fixed nitrogen came up for consideration 

 some two years ago occasion was taken to point out x that a nitrogen 

 situation as a thing apart and to itself did not and could not exist — 

 that it was inextricably involved with the coal-product situation 

 and fertilizer situated, and that the only remedy lay in giving heed 

 to this interrelationship. So it is with the work of mobilizing the 

 various other chemically conducted industries on a war-time basis. 

 The need of giving advance heed to this question was appreciated 

 by our enemies — Germany entered the war as fully prepared in this 

 field as in the military branches. It was inadequately appreciated 

 b} 7 those who eventually came to be our allies, however; while in 

 the United States, up to the actual outbreak of hostilities, it was 

 entirely disregarded as a national issue. Paramount among the 

 problems thus entailed are those presented by the industrial groups 

 having to do with the fertilizer materials necessary to an adequacy 

 of foodstuffs, and with the energy resources requisite to the work of 

 manufacture. In contributing to the solution of these two basic 

 problems investigations projected by Mr. Chester G. Gilbert, com- 

 prising fertilizer materials, sulphur, coal products, power, and petro- 

 leum, have resulted in the publication of pamphlets on the inter- 

 pretation of the fertilizer situation, industrial independence in sul- 

 phur, an object lesson in the resource administration in coal products, 

 and the coal resource and its full utilization. Papers on power and 

 petroleum were completed but not published at the end of the year. 

 In view of the tendency toward duplication in the scientific work 

 in Government departments, it is of special note that it is not pur- 

 posed to initiate any new scientific or technical lines of work, but 

 merely to interpret technical facts in popular form. This is not only 

 of vital importance but it is peculiarly the function of the National 

 Museum. 



NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART. 



In the last report it was stated that foundations had been laid for 

 a granite structure on the Smithsonian Reservation to house the 

 Charles L. Freer Collection. Though some delays were encountered 



1 Sources of nitrogeri compounds in the United States, by Chester G. Gilbert, Smith- 

 sonian Institution Special Publication No. 2421, June, 1916. 



