Page 4 October 1978 No. 245 NEW YORK SHELL CLUB NOTES 
i i . The first, titled "Jensonia," 
madiade ehee Conee SP) ne tag the shell-related artifacts in 
consisted of photographs of many of 
her Be eG worl cetion. Included were land snails cast or carved 
of many materials; bivalves, a Nautilus and others in glass; appro- 
piiately shaped dishes, vases, buttons, cups and pitchers; shells 
as decorations on utilitarian articles; examples of art by Louise 
Travers, Ethelyn Woodlock, and Tony D'Attilio; postage stamps; 
figurines; jewelry with real and simulated shells, and real shells 
"decorated" with worm tubes and barnacles. 
Part two was a record of a collecting trip to Eleuthera. Part three, 
titled "Sea Shell Seekers, or, Position is Everything in Life," con- 
sisted of candid photos that caught club members in various stooping, 
reaching and searching postures, some in highly imaginative protec- 
tive garb, on field trips and other collecting forays. All three 
shows were accompanied by taped narration and appropriate music. 
The second speaker was Richard Goldberg. His subject, under the ti- 
tle "Gems of Tropical Seas," was Cypraea. With the accompaniment 
of color slides he sketched their evolution , and made observations 
on the structure of their mantles, the patterns of pigmentation in 
the shells, and their life cycles. He then showed slides depicting 
the better-known species from over a dozen of their major areas of 
distribution. 
Milton Werner, Recording Sec'y. 
A HELIX MISPLACED? 
In a very nicely written book on plate tectonics, we came across the 
following statement: 
"The garden snail Helix Bones was found in both western Europe and 
the eastern part of Nort merica."* (Frederic Golden, THE MOVING 
CONTINENTS, Chas. Scribner's, 1972, p. 29.) We never heard of Helix 
omatia as an eastern inhabitant. Pilsbry (1939) cites only the 
colony in Michigan introduced there about 1932 by an immigrant, 
plus a single shell discovered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Mr. Golden 
cited this as an instance explained by the Wegener theory of conti- 
nental drift, i.e. identical animals living far apart on distant 
continents. The theory is correct, the example cited is not. 
The mystery probably can be explained simply: Mr. Golden made a 
Slight mistake. He must have meant Helix hortensis (= ee hor- 
tensis) which is indeed found from Quebec and Newfoundlan own +0 
Massachusetts. Pilsbry, like many others, was puzzled by the enigma 
of a European species having lived in North America at least since 
the late Pliocene. The Wegener theory gives a valid explanation, 
i.e. that the two continents about 200 million years ago were joined. 
M. K. Jacobson 
A HUNDRED YEARS aAGo 
No. 6382 in DICK'S ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL RECEIPTS & PROCESSES, 
circa 1870: To Prevent the Formation of a Crust in Tea-kettles. 
Keep an oyster-shell in your tea-kettle. By attracting the stony 
particles to itself, it will prevent the formation of = crust. 
renee 

