Third Museum

Dr. Edward Wigglesworth, director of the Boston Society of Natural History, last week dusted off his whale bones and stuffed birds, celebrated the 100th anniversary of the museum's founding. Because it was a special occasion, Professor Julian Sorell Huxley, Honorary Lecturer at King's College, London, was invited to make a speech to the curators, trustees, members. Professor Huxley, whose favorite recreation is "bird-watching," had much to say which a naturalist would find interesting. A distinguished scientist in his own right, he is the grandson of the late famed Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95), popularizer of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. Professor Huxley complimented the Bostonians on their century's work, emphasized the need for instructing the public in natural history. To illustrate how interested laymen are in animals, he said that in a radio address he had mentioned the strange habit English sparrows have of pecking at crocuses in some districts, spurning them in others. Shortly after he received letters from 200 people giving him information on the sparrow-crocus problem.

The Boston society is the third oldest scientific museum in the U. S.* In 1830, a group of people who liked birds and fish met in Boston at the home of Dr. Walter Channing, obstetrician, to plan a museum. Seven years prior, the Linnean Society of New England had broken up, giving the natural history exhibits which it had collected for nine years to Harvard College, which gladly passed the collection to the new museum.

Although founded to include flora & fauna of the whole U. S., the Boston Museum today is known as a specialist in New England animals, minerals, flowers. It contains a complete exhibit of old New Bedford and Nantucket whaling days, including whaling implements, ambergris, immense whale skeletons. Many famed people have been interested in adding to its collection. Naturalist-Author Henry David Thoreau (1817-62), who learned to love animals while driving his mother's cow to pasture, gave a warbler and some hawk eggs. Daniel Webster (1782-1852) was interested in the society because he liked hunting and fishing. In 1837 he contributed two stuffed oyster-catchers, gawky birds with gaudy red beaks, black and white bodies. Another famed member was tall, smiling Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz (1807-73), Swiss-American naturalist who called every animal and flower "a thought of God."

* Oldest is the Charleston Museum, Charleston, S. C., founded 1773.

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