THE STRUCTURE AND RELATIONSHIPS 
OF OLIARCES (NEUROPTERA) 1 
By Frank M. Carpenter 
Harvard University 
Somewhat more than forty years ago, Dr. John B. Smith, 
while traveling in California, collected a conspicuous neurop- 
terous insect, which was subsequently described by Banks 
(1908) as Oliarces clcwra. Efforts to find additional individ- 
uals were unsuccessful for many years, but a second speci- 
men has at last been secured. Mr. P. A. Adams, of the 
University of California, who received the insect from the 
collector and who has already published a note on its dis- 
covery (1950), kindly loaned me the new specimen for fur- 
ther study and for comparison with the type. I am indebted 
to him for this courtesy and for the opportunity of clarify- 
ing, to some extent, the systematic position of this remark- 
able insect. 
The type locality, “Walters Sta., Calif.”, has been the 
subject of much speculation and its location not generally 
known. According to Mr. Banks (personal communication) 
Smith collected the specimen while the train on which he 
was traveling was stopped at Walters Station for water. 
Current maps do not include this place, but the 1901 edition 
of the Century Atlas shows a “Walters” on the Southern 
Pacific Railroad, about ten miles northwest of the Salton 
Sea bed; and the engineering department of the Southern 
Pacific Company informs me that this was a station around 
1900. It is also listed in Gannett’s “Dictionary of Altitudes” 
(1906), which further states that the “point on base under 
water tank” is 191 feet below sea level. There is no doubt 
in my mind, therefore, that this Walters is the type locality 
of clara. The new specimen was collected near Parker Dam, 
San Bernardino County, about 70 miles from Walters and 
in the same kind of environment. 
1 Published with the aid of a grant from the Museum of Comparative 
Zoology at Harvard College. 
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