An ILLUSTRAIED CATALOGUE 



OF THE 



MOLLUSCA OF MICHIGAN. 



INTRODUCTION. 



REVIEW OF MICHIGAN CONCHOLOGY. 



Barring a few scattering descriptions by European naturalists of such 

 species as were brought home by the early travellers in this country, the 

 history of North American conchology may be said to have begun when 

 Thomas Say, in 1817, wrote the article on '^Conchology" for the first Ameri- 

 can edition of Nicholson's Encyclopedia of Arts and Sciences. Philadelphia 

 then, as now, was the centre of activity in this branch of science in the 

 United States, and in the proceedings of the then newly organized Academy 

 of Natural Science and a few other scientific and literary publications of 

 that city, nearly all the conchological writings for the next twenty years 

 are to be found. 



The first record of Michigan conchology was made in 1822, when Thomas 

 Rackett, an English naturahst, in the Transactions of the Linnean Society 

 of London, published a list of seven species of shells collected near Thunder 

 Bay, Alpena county. One of these, Polygyra monodon, still bear? the name 

 which he gave to it. 



Michigan, as such, had no distinctive name in those days, and was known 

 only as a wilderness filled with swamps and savages and located somewhere 

 in that still greater and more indefinite region called the northwest. 



But as population increased and young blood from the New England 

 states made itself felt in the new territory, there began a dawn of better 

 things. And one of the first acts of the first legislature of the new state of 

 Michigan in 1837 was the establishment of a State Geological Survey with 

 Douglass Houghton at its head as Geologist and Dr. Abram Sager as Zo- 

 ologist. Dr. Sager, who in after years became so well known in the Medical 

 Department of the State University, and, who had already in 1836 supphed 

 Conrad with material for his monograph of the Unionidce, entered with 

 activity upon the duties of his position and in 1839 published the first paper 

 upon Michigan conchology. It is simply a list of species, 76 in number, 

 one of which was not identified. It is dated January 12, 1839, and is to be 

 found in the Documents of the House of Representatives for 1839 at page 

 410. 



