soflt'd Ixiiifs. some mc;i>iir;il)ly cntiic, bill the iiKijor ])(irliiin in fraj;- 

 ments. and .ill (DNficd with ;i icii;i( ions coat of brea. These had 

 (o be cleaned, the various Iraj^ments that belonged loj^elher selected 

 from the jumbled mass; the various bones that belonged in an indi- 

 vidual skeleton assembled and th(^ whole articulated and mounted in 

 durable form true to the plan of an animal that existed some two 

 hundred thousand years ago, which has been extinct for untold cen- 

 turies, and even the semblence to which the reconstructor may never 

 have seen. A number of skeletons had thus been prepared by the 

 Academy of Sciences, under the Manipulation of Prof. H. Z. Gilbert, 

 and were thus turned into the Museum; Dr. Daggett took up this 

 difficult task /;/ nicdias res, and continued it until all the possibilities 

 that lay in the jumbled boxes had been exhausted. Then he secured 

 a concession from INIrs. Ross, the owner of the Brea Beds, and started 

 on another series of excavations more exhaustive and more extensive 

 than any previously performed. The result of this work, added to 

 what had alread}- been done by the Academy of Sciences, the Uni- 

 versity of California, the Los Angeles High School, and one or two 

 other investigators, was sufficient to astonish the scientific world. It 

 proved the Brea Beds to be the richest deposit of prehistoric remains 

 ever discovered. About four hundred skulls of the Saber-tooth 

 Tiger were taken out, and about an equal number of skulls of other 

 mammals. Of course it was not possible to reconstruct from the 

 broken mass complete skeletons for all of these skulls, but the rep- 

 resentation as to types is believed to be very full. The collection 

 includes, besides the Saber-tooth Tiger in all ages and sizes, the Im- 

 perial Elephant, the Mastodon, the Camel, the giant Ground Sloth, 

 the Bison, the Wolf, the Coyote, the Horse (of prehistoric type), the 

 Teratornis, a giant bird, larger than the South American Condor, 

 and a considerable number of other animals. A number of new types 

 were found. All the specimens identified were made subjects of care- 

 ful study by scientists under special direction of Dr. Merriam, of 

 the University of California, and a number of papers of the greatest 

 scientific interest by Dr. Merriam and members of his staff, have 

 been published by the University. So we may say that the scientific 

 value of the wonderful deposits of the Brea Beds has been well ex- 

 ploited for the benefit of the world, and Los Angeles enjoys the dis- 

 tinction of possessing the only complete museum of these specimens. 

 While the L'niversity of California excavated and still possesses a 

 large number of these fossils they are not available at present for 

 museum purposes. 



In the tremendous scientific undertaking above outlined, Dr. Dag- 

 gett took a large and important part, and his work in this is sufficient 

 to carry his name down to posterity as a great public benefactor. In 

 fact the entire Museum will stand as an enduring monument to his 

 large grasp of matters of scientific, artistic and historical value, his 

 great organizing ability, his indomitable energy and his single- 

 minded devotion to a work of public beneficence. 



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