UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 
ASTRO PHYSICAL OBSERVATORY 
NATIONAL AIR MUSEUM 
NATIONAL ZOOLOGICAL PARK 
Dr. Alexander Wetmore, 
Hotel Tivoli, 
Ancon, Canal Zone. 
Dear Dr. Wetmore: 
SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 
NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART 
NATIONAL COLLECTION OF FINE ARTS 
FREER GALLERY OF ART 
INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE SERVICE 
CANAL ZONE BIOLOGICAL AREA 
msMnyirni 2.5, B.C. 
'US. A. 
March 
30, 1948. 
This is a letter dealing largely with the Interdepartmental Committee on 
Research and Development. The enclosed letter to Tom Nolan explains some work 
I have done;in looking for a director for this committee. I went over to get 
some information on Ted Byerly who had been recommended by Zwemer. While Shaw was 
non-committal, he did not go far beyond saying that Byerly was an excellent man; 
but he immediately jumped to Cardon with Fracker as second choice. He told me 
frankly that Cardon would have to have one or two rather competent assistants of 
about the P-7 level to do his leg work for him, but that Cardon himself would be '{ 
an excellent man in coordinating the work. I believe you know him well so that it 
is unnecessary for me to say what I think of him. Incidentally, this ability to 
coordinate in the director is going to save the chairman of the committee an awful 
lot of work and worry. I have been picking up information in various places and 
I believe you will find that there is quite a divergence of opinion rather clearly 
divided as between the civilian and military. The military will be very anxious 
to go along on OSPD standards with very heavy contracting of research. This 
obviously will work only in cases where the research consists of a lot of short- 
time jobs, such as perfecting military equipment. For most of the civilian 
research, where long-time projects are the rule, contracting would be most wasteful 
and inefficient since we cannot afford to train men and give them experience and 
then have them unavailable when we really need them. I might say that this trend 
toward contracting is getting to be quite a fad with Congress. Shaw told me that 
the trend was running strongly in that direction for Agriculture and that they 
were greatly worried since they simply could not do their work on such a basis. 
Agriculture does carry on quite a bit of contracting but only for its short-time 
projects. Its need for seasoned men on its own staff is just as great as ours for 
most of its work. 
What I am going to tell you in this letter is largely gossip, and I cannot 
vouch for its accuracy; but it is information I have picked up from various sources 
and in view of your position as chairman, I think it should be made available to you. 
I have been told that the reason the military was so anxious to have you as chair¬ 
man of the committee is that they wanted to be certain that Condon would not get the 
job. My informant did not tell me why; perhaps you know. I believe, however, that 
you are coming in with a whole-hearted hacking of all of the various agencies in 
the committee. Shaw told me that Agriculture was very happy that you are chairmanj 
and with military backing, you will be assured of starting in with good support. 
