UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 
ASTROPHYSICAL OBSERVATORY 
NATIONAL AIR MUSEUM 
NATIONAL ZOOLOGICAL PARK 
NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART 
NATIONAL COLLECTION OF FINE ARTS 
FREER GALLERY OF ART 
INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE SERVICE 
CANAL ZONE BIOLOGICAL AREA 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 
March 13 , 1951 
VIA AIR MAIL 
Dr. A. Wetmore 
c/o Mr. James Zetek 
Drawer C. 
Balboa, Canal Zone 
Dear Dr. Wetmore: 
Acknowledgment is made of your letter of February 28 , in which you 
report on the status of things on Barro Colorado Island and rub salt into 
an old wound by mentioning the sad condition of our motor generators. I 
regret to say that this condition will continue to recur at intervals 
until we have a cable, but at the moment the chance of accomplishing this 
desired end does not seem bright unless we can find a wealthy friend who 
is able to underwrite the job for us. At the present time, we think we 
foresee on the construction items a savings of $60,000 and, possibly, 
with a savings on Mitman's rent, we might be able to raise the full cost 
of the cable. It appears, however, that we cannot possibly consider 
this method of procedure since there is always the chance that we might 
be directed by the Bureau of the Budget to return unexpended funds to 
the Treasury. If we asked for the cable, the unexpended funds would be 
specified as amounting to between eighty and ninety thousand dollars. A 
possible loss of this size is a luxury we cannot afford. Also the fact 
that we have never asked for the cable would make it a great deal more 
likely that request would be made for impounding the funds than would be 
the case in asking for the use of such funds for the Clark Mountain Ob¬ 
servatory. Jack Keddy has had several talks with men at the Budget 
Bureau and, as a result of these talks, we are basing our request for 
the use of the saving of approximately $60,000 on construction items for 
the building of the Clark Mountain Observatory, the latest estimate on 
this has gone up to over $52,000, but we have put it up on the basis 
that we switch the construction funds to Clark Mountain this year with 
the hope of using the Clark Mountain funds for next year (if and when 
we get them) on our construction job here. The enclosed copy of a letter 
to Mr. Lawton will explain this to you and I have asked Jack to add some 
comments since he is directly on the line of fire. He has done some 
excellent missionary work on this matter and cleared out a few roadblocks. 
We had hoped to complete this on an informal basis but request was made that 
we take it up formally, hence the letter. You will notice it is very 
carefully hedged so I do not think that on the basis of this letter they can 
