74 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



window sills and precipitate stone and plaster ceilings. Marble 

 wainscotings will chip and fall, tile will loosen and soldered joints 

 will melt. 



The selection of the top hall about the western stairway seemed to 

 insure absolute immunity from destruction by fire, but if one were 

 disposed to ask why the Museum authorities of some fifteen years 

 ago did not provide fireproof metal cases and thus doubly insure the 

 valuable collections from damage by fire, a reasonable answer would 

 be that the installation in glass cases with metal frames could in 

 nowise have saved the specimens but only have helped to destroy 

 them. Of the wooden framed cases, only those directly in contact 

 with the root of the flame were burned to their bases. Those exposed 

 to the indirect shafts of flame were not burned, and in some cases 

 the varnish was not even blistered, though the heat was intense 

 enough to melt the glass and expose the contents of the cases. In 

 such of the cases as contained metal supports for shelves, the sup- 

 ports warped and fell and threw the specimens to the lowest level 

 in the case. With the cracking of the plate glass the specimens were 

 thrown in confusion. In the four-sided cases the heavy wooden 

 framework of the case was in no instance burned though in all the 

 glass was cracked by the heat. 



A second destructive force was the falling of the heavy sandstone 

 ceiling. Chunk by chunk the stone fell, the pieces varying from 

 three or four cubic inches to great blocks of half a cubic yard. It 

 was the falling of such masses of stone that crushed the cases not 

 otherwise injured. The use of water in the hall to reduce the heat 

 and extinguish the fire was almost as destructive in certain cases. 

 The buckskin clothes in superheated cases were entirely ruined by the 

 play of water upon the glass. The glass cracked and the water enter- 

 ing the cases shrunk the skin articles to one-fourth their size and 

 left them crisp, shriveled objects when the heat had dried them 

 again. 



Public interest. Public interest in the work of this section 

 has largely increased. This is due, first, to the natural interest 

 created by a definitely organized archeological and ethnological 

 bureau with a definite policy ; and second, to the unusual activities 

 resulting from the use of the funds provided by Mrs F. F. Thompson 

 for carrying out the plan to create a series of ethnological groups. 

 These groups, described elsewhere in this portion of the report, have 

 attracted the attention of many persons interested in history and in 

 anthropology. 



Correspondence has grown as the result of the awakened interest 



