Statement by the 

 Secretary 



I. Michael Heyman 



A few years ago, a number of scholars at the Smithsonian 

 convened a meeting at the National Zoo that they titled 

 "What About Increase?" They were concerned that the 

 research function of the Smithsonian had become the hidden 

 part of the Institution's dual mission to promore "the increase 

 and diffusion of knowledge." 



It is not, of course, surprising that most Americans think of 

 the Smithsonian principally in terms of our museums and their 

 exhibitions and programs. They are the public face of the 

 Institution and represent our vital commitment to education. But 

 there is another Smithsonian — the Smithsonian of research 

 instirutes in Massachusetts, Panama, and Maryland, of field 

 expeditions throughout the world, of scholarly investigations 

 into vanishing technologies, historical traditions, and artistic 

 expression. It is that Smithsonian, committed to expanding the 

 boundaries of knowledge, that we celebrate here. 



At the time James Smithson made his generous and 

 mysterious bequest to the people of the United States in the 

 1820s, America was far from the research giant it has become 

 in our century. While we will never know Smithson's exact 

 intentions for the new institution he imagined, the 

 Smithsonian's first Secretary, Joseph Henry, argued that since 

 Smithson had himself been a scientist (with more than 200 

 scientific papers to his name), it must have been his intention 

 to found in the New World "an organization which should 

 promote original scientific researches." Henry, known for his 

 experiments with electromagnetism, was in the vanguard of a 

 rising generation of American scientists and saw in Smithson's 

 bequest an opportunity to create, in the unlikely precincts of 

 the capital city, a place devoted to pure research: in his words, 

 a "college of discoverers." 



So devoted was Henry to his vision that he downplayed the 

 potential for public education in the use of Smithson's funds. 



The notion of a national museum left him cold, and even the 

 construction of a great building on what is now the National 

 Mall struck him as a diversion of monies more usefully spent 

 in the support of investigations in all branches of knowledge 

 and the dissemination of findings in publications and other 

 forms of scholarly exchange. 



Happily for us today, Henry was not entirely able to stop 

 the Smithsonian from undertaking responsibility for the care 

 of national collections, nor, for that matter, could he stop the 

 creation of a tradition of great buildings on the Mall to 

 present them. His enduring legacy to the Smithsonian, 

 though, was to underscore and establish the importance of a 

 research agenda of the highest standard. 



Within two years of the Institution's founding in 1846, 

 Henry had already demonstrated the potential of his stubborn 

 vision. At a time when only two other U.S. institutions 

 sponsored the publication of research results, he initiated the 

 series Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, which 

 continues to the present day as the Smithsonian Contributions 

 and Studies Series Program. The first volume, Ancient 

 Monuments of the Mississippi, a study of Indian mounds, has 

 been described as a "milestone in the development of 

 American anthropology." Henry also saw the Smithsonian's 

 potential as a catalyst and cootdinator of scientific inquiry 

 throughout the nation and the world. Using the hot new 

 technology of the telegraph, he set up a network of hundreds 

 of observers to chart weather conditions throughout the 

 United States and as far away as South America. This 

 innovation created a base for the new science of meteorology, 

 grounded in the accumulation of long-range data, and led to 

 the establishment of the U.S. Weather Bureau in 1869. 



Henry's interest in the emerging field we now call 

 anthropology bore spectacular fruit when he persuaded John 



