Museum Support dciitc). Silver Hill, Manlaiid. 



The place at Suitland, Maryland, 



is made of concrete blocks. 

 And here now the Smithsonian 



will keep its extra stocks 

 Of everything it doesn't really need 



now right away 

 But thinks that very likely 



it will want to use some day.'' 

 The transf er of collections to the Smithsonian's Sup- 

 port Center is not the same as the move from the Castle 

 to the first National Museum, the journey across the 

 Mall in 1910, or the spreading into the wings. The first 

 three were expansions of previous activities; this is a 

 new concept. It is a fairly safe prediction that the major 

 events of the next twenty-five years in the history of 

 the Museuin of Natural History will be linked to his 

 new facility. 



New space provides new opportunities and presents 

 new problems. The Museum Support Center will be a 

 museum of record like none before. It will certainly 

 bring out new approaches to the collections. The ques- 

 tion of what is to be moved and what is to stay has 

 already generated a great deal of controversy and will 

 generate inore, but the nation's treasures are being 

 preserved for posterity in better condition than could 

 ever have been realized in Rathbun's attics. 



Finale 



In seventy-five years, the Museum of Natural History 

 has gotten bigger, and in many ways it has gotten better. 

 Its halls have shaken out the hodgepodge of its first 

 fifty years to achieve a steady focus on natural history. 

 It is entertaining and educating over six million visitors 

 a year. It gathers millions of fresh samples from nature 

 every year, and has learned to keep track of them. 

 During three-quarters of a century, the workers within 

 its walls have given good service in performing the 

 functions of record, research, and exhibit, and it "re- 

 mains the nation's most important center for systematic 

 research.'"" In the final analysis, because the Museum 

 is a government bureau, the Congress must decide 

 whether the taxpayers it represents have gotten their 

 money's worth. On the other hand, it may be equally 

 appropriate for the Museum to question the nation. 

 Perhaps both nation and Museum would pass the two- 

 way test proposed by George Brown Goode, again cap- 

 italizing as he did on the rare occasions when he thought 

 it important: THE DEGREE OF CIVILIZATION 

 TO WHICH ANY NATION, CITY OR PROVINCE 

 HAS ATTAINED IS BEST SHOWN BY THE 

 CHARACTER OF ITS PUBLIC MUSEUMS AND 

 THE LIBERALITY WITH WHICH THEY ARE 

 MAINTAINED."" □ 



206 



The Museum 



