A return to
New Guinea’s
north coast,

‘in the footsteps
of A.B. Lewis’

Page 1

Three new exhibits:

e Alaskan Indian crafts
e African-American quilts
¢ Living amid Mayan shadows

Page 5

The
Barbara Brown

monkey

A zoological anomaly
made right, after 167 years
Page 71

The Bulletin of the Fielt Musciim of watural History

The Museum's new
exhibit program has
led to controversy.
President Boyd says
that’s as it should be.

Ornamental mask.
Bronze with inlaid
fron and copper.
From the Fuller

- Benin Collection.

There'll be some
changes made —
and meanwhile
some familiar halls
will be closed.

6-7

Plan ahead! Here’s
your two-month
calendar of Field
Museum openings
and special events.

ETURN TO

NEW GUINEA

By John Terrell

Curator of Oceanic Archaeology and Ethnology
and Robert L. Welsch

Visiting Associate Curator of Anthropology

ever go anywhere for the first time.”
That’s what the late Karl P. Schmidt,
one of Field Museum’s legendary old-
time curators of zoology, said was the
secret to successful field work. It’s a hard rule
to follow. This year, however, the two of us
came close to doing just that.

During April and May, we traveled to the
north coast of New Guinea in the southwestern
Pacific to determine how successful we might
be if we mount a major new Field Museum
expedition to this distant part of the world in
1991. Each of us had conducted anthropologi-
cal research in other parts of the modern nation
of Papua New Guinea in the 1970s. But for
both of us, this was our first visit to New
Guinea’s north coast, an area little studied by
anthropologists since World War I.

But this wasn’t the first time a Field Muse-
um anthropologist had been to this part of New
Guinea. Eighty years ago our predecessor,
Curator Albert B. Lewis, Ph.D. (1867-1940),
had spent five months on the north coast during
Field Museum’s 1909-1913 Joseph N. Field
Expedition to make collections for the Museum

and to study the lives of the

diverse peoples he
encountered there.

In keeping

Story on Page 4

9

Despite the traffic
snarl, thousands
came for Members’
Night. The story in
pictures.

FOSSIL GILLED MUSHROOM,
40 MILLION YEARS OLD

R olf Singer, a Field Museum botanist, has
identified the oldest mushroom ever found,
a 40-million-year-old specimen discovered by a
University of California entomologist in an
amber mine in the Dominican Republic.

Story on Page 11

John Terrell (foreground, second from left) with villagers from Tumleo
Island on the beach at Aitape. This double outrigger canoe — very much
like the ones A.B. Lewis photographed in 1909 — had just brought Terrell
and Robert L. Welsch back from Sapi Village on Tumleo.

with Schmidt’s prescription for success, we set
off for Papua New Guinéa “in the footsteps” of
A. B. Lewis. Our destination was the sleepy lit-
tle town of Aitape in the West Sepik Province.
Our objective: to find out if new field research
around Aitape would offer new insights about
the collections Lewis had made there in 1909.
We also wanted to see if it was still possible to
add to the considerable information Lewis
brought back about traditional trade between
villages on the coast. Our plan was to bring
with us photos of the artifacts Lewis had col-
lected as a way of learning more about the peo-
ple who had made them.

When we left Chicago late in March, we
were far from confident about what we would

find when we reached Aitape. Would people

welcome us into their villages today as they had
welcomed Lewis in 1909? Would people be
interested in seeing photographs of the things
Lewis brought back from their villages? Would
people still remember the artifacts their grand-

BUT IS IT ART?

A n advisory panel of anthropologists helping the Muse-
um prepare its new permanent exhibit on Africa dis-
cussed “the politics of representation” in dealing with things
African. The answer to this particular question was yes; the art of
Benin was much like that of Renaissance Florence in its royal patron-
age and guild traditions — in fact the Medici collected contemporary
Benin art. But why should we need princes and kings to validate beauty?

Photo: RL. Welsch
parents made and used so long ago? Eighty
years, after all, is a long time. We didn’t know
how much life in the villages might have
changed after two world wars, independence,
new forms of transportation, and the introduc-
tion of a modern cash economy.

In the Footsteps of A. B. Lewis

Before we left, we knew that A. B. Lewis
himself had been very successful in New
Guinea and the Melanesian Islands. We had
been warned by colleagues elsewhere in the
United States that Lewis’s expedition had been
so successful that his would be a hard — if not
impossible — act to follow.

The Joseph N. Field Expedition made
Lewis the first American anthropologist ever to
conduct long-term research in Melanesia (nearly
20 years before Margaret Mead’s sojourn to
New Guinea in the late 1920s).

During four trying years, Lewis overcame
many hardships to achieve success in the field:
frequent bouts of malaria, a nearly fatal attack
of blackwater fever, and constant problems with
transportation.

Despite these hardships, Lewis put together
one of the greatest anthropological collections
from the Pacific to be found anywhere in the
world. The A. B. Lewis Collection is, in fact,
the largest such ever brought back from Melane-
sia by a single collector and contains artifacts
from every part of this vast region then
explored.

During his travels, Lewis also took nearly
2,000 black and white photos of village life

(Continued on Page 10)

MUSEUMS AS

By Willard L. Boyd
President, Field Museum

rom the outset, Field Museum has sought to
F be a community center of learning, The
founders of our Museum were eager to serve the
general citizenry, and so the Field Museum has
one of the largest public exhibition spaces in the
world.

As in the past, museum learning today cen-
ters on exhibits. While our staff and volunteers
conduct important educational programming,
the exhibit standing alone is the principal means
by which a museum educates.

Our exhibits have always been pioneering
and, therefore, always controversial. Com-
mencing with Carl Akeley in the 1900s, we
were a leader in realistic mountings of speci-
mens in diorama context. In the 1940s and
1950s, the Museum was a leader in reducing the
number of objects on display in order to intro-
duce more object-based concepts about natural
history and anthropology. A 1955 article in
Collier's Magazine speaks directly to our lead-
ership then, much in the same way that an arti-
cle last January in The New York Times Maga-
zine speaks to present-day Field Museum lead-
ership in exhibits.

As our object-based research becomes
more conceptual, it follows that our exhibits
will also. Contemporary exhibit debates focus
on how many objects should be included in
exhibits and how far the exhibits should go in
interpreting the ideas associated with objects.
In resolving these issues we must have the audi-
ence at the forefront of our thinking.

Our audience is diverse in age, cultural tra-
dition, and knowledge of our subject matter.
Visitors need not satisfy any academic prerequi-
sites to be admitted to the Museum. We award
no credit for completing the exhibit. There is
no compulsory attendance law, career-place-
ment office, or even beloved teacher to induce
attendance. Our objective is not to graduate
Visitors, but rather to have them stay in the
exhibits longer, learn more, and return to the
Museum frequently throughout their lifetimes.
Museum visitors learn on their own. There is
no teacher in the exhibit to lead visitors through
lessons about biodiversity and multiculturalism.

To help the visitor learn on his or her own,
we use a variety of media: labels and dioramas
that are miniature and life-size, glass-enclosed

In the Field

September/October 1990
Vol. 61, No. 5

Editor:
Ron Dorfman

Art Director:
Shi Yung

In the Field (ISSN #1051-4546) is published bimonthly by Field Museum of Natural History, Roosevelt Road at
Lake Shore Drive, Chicago IL 60605-2496. Copyright © 1990 Field Museum of Natural History. Subscriptions
$6.00 annually, $3.00 for schools. Museum membership includes In the Field subscription. Opinions expressed
by authors are their own and do not necessarily reflect policy of Field Museum. Unsolicited manuscipts are wel-
come. Museum phone (312) 922-9410. Notification of address change should include address label and should
be sent to Membership Department. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to In the Field, Field Museum of
Natural History, Second class postage paid at Chicago, Illinois.

Seplember/October 1990)

CENTERS OF LEARNING

and walk-through simulated environments like
our Pawnee Earth Lodge, Egyptian tomb, and
Pacific atoll. We employ questions and
answers, books, magazines, maps (1,700), news
clippings, computers, videotapes, models,
experiments, and all the other self-learning tech-
niques used in contemporary education.

The accuracy of the exhibit message
depends upon the curators, who are research-
directed, who are stewards of the collections,
and who are often in the field collecting or
researching. As they perform those crucial
functions, our museum school is open every
day, from nine to five. Our student body
requires that the curatorial knowledge be deliv-
ered daily and effectively. Exhibits need to be
constantly renewed and monitored for accuracy
and effectiveness. Just as we want to be at the
forefront in creating new object-based knowl-
edge, so we want to be at the forefront in com-
municating that knowledge with objects.

Since our collections are encyclopedic, our
exhibits historically have utilized only a small
fraction of the entire collection. There always
will be contention as to how many objects to
present in any given exhibit. Nevertheless,
objects must be central to every level of exhibit,
and curators must play a vital role in exhibit
development. But their primary role must be in
collections and research. Accordingly, we need
a cadre of museum educators focusing on how
best to deliver our educational message to a
diverse general public. Museum educators must
be experts on independent learning.

At the same time, it is imperative that
exhibit content be of the highest quality, and so
we have a museum protocol that provides for
curatorial review of exhibit development and for
specific kinds of consultation between the Vice
President for Collections and Research and the
Vice President for Public Programs. However,
the responsibility for the development of
exhibits is in the office of the Vice President for
Public Programs because planning, develop-
ment, financing, and budgeting of large-scale
exhibits is a multi-million-dollar venture and we
need full-time leadership for each exhibit.

Understandably, there are tensions about
how to do exhibits and what should be con-
tained in them. This is a good sign. If there
were no tension, our metabolic rate would be
too low to be on the frontier of exhibit develop-
ment in the 1990s as we have been in the past.

Carol Saper with E. Leland Webber
(left) and Museum President Blaine J. Yarrington.

LETTERS

] like your new format — seems to be more

accessible and current. Not that I didn’t enjoy

all those beautiful photographs! But this is a
nice change.

HARLE MONTGOMERY

Northbrook, IL

It’s newsy, but wasn’t the former [Bulletin]
also? I note the lack of color. Many of us as
well as libraries and other small museums keep
your bulletins on file for reference and research.
How will it hold up now that it is on newsprint?

JOHN Cook

Berwyn, IL

I have been a member of the Field Museum so
long that “memory runneth not to the contrary.”
I even remember when the Field Museum
had traveling exhibits that were very worth-
while, especially for younger people. Maybe
something like that could be done for the South
Suburbs, as so many of us are not able to par-
take of the Field Museum services as others.
JUDGE HENRY X. DIETCH (RET.)
Homewood, IL

I have probably not been to the Museum for
over ten tears but have kept the membership
since I enjoy the magazine. The articles are
good and the pictures are great. However, the
July/August new version of Jn the Field hit an
all-time low. The article on the Red-tailed
ewtonia was good but leaves a lot to be
desired without a color picture. Much of the
rest of the “magazine” was filled with informa-
tion that was of little use to a person like
myself. Examples of the latter would be the
calendar and “Behind the Scenes.”
JOHN R. SHANER
Danville, IL

After I read the article [on the death of E.
Leland Webber, former president and director
of the Museum] in the March/April edition of
the Bulletin, I went to my desk drawer and
pulled out my copy of the September 1974 edi-
tion, which I have saved all these years. On
page 21, there is a picture of me, at age nine,
with Mr. Webber, at the Museum’s June 25,
1974 Rededication Ceremony. I had been the
lucky winner of the Museum’s “Cornerstone
Contest” and a drawing I had made was placed
into the new cornerstone.

Mr. Webber stands out in my mind as being
especially kind, and I remember talking to him
and feeling the great pride and joy he took in
the Museum. He made me want to remain a mem-
ber of the Field Museum for the rest of my life!

I also remember visiting the Museum with
my family soon after the Rededication Ceremo-
ny, and stopping by to visit Mr, Webber in his

ety office. I will never
forget how genuinely
happy he was to see
us again, and how
happy he was when
we told him how
much we always
enjoyed visiting the
Museum. I remain a
proud member of the
Field Museum, and
will think of Mr.
Webber every time I
visit. His work and
his dreams will live
on forever!
CAROL (SAPER)
BERMAN
Chicago

GEN §2254,12

THE MISSION OF
PUBLIC PROGRAMS

By Ron Dorfman

Editor, /n the Field
fe very so often, Field Museum has taken a
new look at its exhibits and set about redo-
ing them. In a draft monograph on his exhibit
work, Donald Collier, curator emeritus of Mid-
dle and South American archaeology and
ethnology, fixes points of change at roughly
1921, with the move to the new building; 1941,
the start of major renovation of the anthropolo-
gy exhibits; 1968, with the creation and staffing
of a full-time department of exhibits; and 1985,
with the establishment of the public programs
function separate from collections and research.

Clifford C. Gregg, then director of the
Museum, said in 1955 when the renoyation of
the North American Indian exhibits was receiy-
ing wide attention that it was a permanent
exhibit — “by which we mean, permanent until
we can do a better job.” The job the exhibits are
meant to perform is to get a diverse public into
the Museum, to engage them once there, to
encourage them to explore, and to open the
gates of scholarship for the serious amateur.

The Museum’s current exhibit-redevelop-
ment program, like the one begun by Paul S.
Martin, chief curator of anthropology, in 1941,
has stirred controversy in the museum world
and even internally; the domestic dispute was
aired this year under such headlines as “Show-
manship vs. Scholarship” (Chicago Tribune)
and “Say Goodbye to the Stuffed Elephants”
(The New York Times Magazine).

These and other articles, reporting on the
dramatic changes under way at the Museum,
note that some Museum curators have expressed
profound reservations about the program.
Which is true enough but somewhat misleading.
John Terrell of the department of anthropology
said in a letter to the Times that as the son of a
Hollywood film studio executive he appreciated
the value of showmanship and good box-office
as much as anyone. The real issue, he said, was
that the Museum had veered too sharply from its
previous approach to exhibit development, in
which responsibility was shared by a designer, a
curator, and an educator. Now, he said, that
approach was giving way to one which held that
“one person, the “exhibit developer,’ can some-
how manage it all from above.”

There are differences of opinion as to
whether the designer-curator-educator system
worked more smoothly or efficaciously than the
current system, in which curators are supposed
to consult on and referee the scientific accuracy
of exhibits and the use of specimens. But the
intellectual issues reflected in these organiza-
tional arrangements are of great importance to
museum practice here and elsewhere.

Unlike all but a few other museums, the
Field is not only a venue for public education
but also a basic-research organization — in
effect, a small university organized into depart-
ments of zoology, botany, geology, and anthro-
pology. In the mid-1980s, the Museum went
through a period of self-analysis that resulted in
recognition of a duality of mission: research on
the one hand and public education on the other.
Both missions, Museum officials are quick to
insist, are based on collections and are inextrica-
bly interwoven.

Michael Spock, who became vice president
for public programs in 1986, says he tries to
approach exhibits in such a way that the public
can see objects from the collections as much as
possible the way curators see them:

“Everything that’s been brought into a
museum collection has been torn out of the con-

text that originally gave it meaning,” he
observes, “so that an Eskimo seal-hunting kit or
a ritual object from Melanesia or a bird is
stripped, by the act of collecting, of a lot of
information. Now, a lot of effort is made to hang
onto that contextual information through field
notes, photographs, and so on, and for the schol-
ar a lot of the context that makes the thing
understandable is built into his head — from his
past experience or the literature he can sit down
and read.

“For people who don’t have that experience
and training, the restoration of context is a much
more complicated task. So everything that has
to do with exhibit technique — audio-visual,
computers, dioramas, you name it — everything
that’s been invented in the last 150 years of
museum exhibit work, was all an effort to
restore enough of the contextual setting for
those objects so they can speak directly to the
visitor. All of the things we keep trying to
invent as we’ve begun to understand that task
are attempts to find ways to get a dialogue going
between the object and the visitor.”

One impediment to that dialogue at Field
Museum, Spock says, was the departmental
classification of exhibits, and part of his assign-
ment coming in was to adopt an interdisci-
plinary approach to them.

“So many of the kinds of content or topics
that might be talked about in the Museum were
cross-disciplinary topics,” he says, “and every-
thing in the Museum had been organized by [the
departments of] zoology, botany, geology, and
anthropology, and then within those there were
divisions of birds, there were Melanesian cura-
tors, and so not only was every hall assigned to
a topic, but it was just about impossible to pull
back and say, okay, how would we talk about
issues that cut across here.”

Another aspect of Spock’s assignment was
to stimulate the Museum’s existing audience
and to try to make the Museum of greater inter-
est to Chicago’s growing “minority” communi-
ties. This was an acknowledgement of “the
institution’s commitment to serving a diverse
public, diverse not just ethnically or by educa-
tion or age but also in terms of the various agen-
das that they bring to a museum visit and the
different learning styles that people have,”
Spock says. A single nine-year-old, he points
out, may come to the Museum with his school
class, with his family, or “with a couple of bud-
dies just wandering in off the street,” and on
each occasion will have different needs that the
Museum should be able to meet.

The final charge was to make a yery visible
difference in a relatively short period of time, so
that by the Museum’s centennial celebration in
1993-94 “it would feel like maybe you were
beginning to get a new direction to the Museum,
anew sense of momentum.”

Spock and his public-programs colleagues
developed a set of strategies to respond to this
multifaceted assignment.

First, since “nobody was going to be able to
see the whole museum on one visit, and proba-
bly not in their lifetime, you had to structure the
museum so it was full of choices that people
could make to suit their own agendas.” Exhibits
would be both physically and intellectually
organized on three levels, with single-concept,
introductory exhibits like “Sizes” and the forth-
coming “Nature Walk” immediately accessible
from Stanley Field Hall; major thematic, inter-
disciplinary exhibits like “Inside Ancient
Egypt” and “Traveling the Pacific” arrayed on
the long east-west hallways; and resource cen-
ters for more in-depth study, like the Webber

center for Native American cultures, adjacent to
but separate from the thematic exhibits.

Second, there would be multiple and redun-
dant pathways to information. Spock cites the
section on island formation in “Traveling the
Pacific,’ where there are charts, labels, a simu-
lated lava flow, television footage, a working
model of plate formation, a zoetrope, samples of
lava rock, and more. “You could do one-tenth
of that and say, Here’s what you need to know
about island formation, but in fact you wouldn’t
hook on to all the people that you might have a
chance to hook on to,” Spock says.

Third, there would be constant evaluation,
starting with surveys of what the potential audi-
ence already knows or doesn’t know about the
subject (“front-end” evaluation); proceeding
through the testing-out of options that occur as
exhibit development progresses (‘“formative”
evaluation); and ultimately seeing how the fin-
ished exhibit actually works with Museum visi-
tors (“summative” evaluation). “And something
that’s really quite radical and hasn’t been done
very often,” Spock adds, “is that we’re trying to
save out ten percent of the production budget
for building the exhibit to go back and do revi-
sions based on what’s working and what isn’t.
In a sense the exhibit opening is a draft and not
the final thing.”

By the time of the centennial, then, these
strategies will have been used to redevelop near-
ly half of the Museum’s 300,000 square feet of
exhibit space using the Egyptian, West African,
and Pacific materials along with special collec-
tions in gems and botany as well as the popular
dinosaur, mammal, and bird collections.

Museum research constantly develops new
techniques to study the collections, and Museum
exhibitry has constantly been reinvented to dis-
play them to the public. Given the common
subject matter of the research and exhibits —
diversity in the world’s environments and
human cultures — it should probably not be sur-
prising that there are diverse approaches to these
essential missions.

ERRATA

* Scheduling problems have forced cancellation of the Founders’
Council Award of Merit program honoring Oscar Arias Sanchez,
announced for October (/TF, July/August 1990, p.1).

Ron Testa GN 84360

Michael Spock, vice
president for public
programs: “A dia-
logue between the
object and the
visitor.”

* The headline and story on curatorial appointments in the
July/August issue (p. 3) mistakenly implied that Olivier C. Rieppel,
curator of paleontology, had been appointed in the department of
zoology. His appointment is in the department of geology.

Seplember/Octaber 1990

UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS

AFRICA PROJECT

“THE POLITICS

Virtually any state-
ment made about
Africa or Africans
in the context of
an American mu-
seum exhibit is

= freighted with a
“politics of representation” that needs to be
acknowledged and understood by exhibit devel-
opers. The point, made by several of the schol-
ars gathered for the fifth in a series of roundta-
bles convened to help Field Museum plan its
major new exhibit on Africa, was introduced by
Smithsonian Institution curator Ivan Karp, who
said it was especially critical in an interdisci-
plinary exhibit where natural history has a ten-
dency to overwhelm social history.

The need to protect threatened and endan-
gered species would naturally be a theme of any
Field Museum exhibit. But in Tanzania, Karp
noted, in order to create a game reserve, pas-
toralists have had to be displaced. “A question,”
he said: “What would it look like if one of the
voices [that may be included in the exhibit] was
a Masai herdsman now made part of a rural pro-
letariat? . . . In Kenya, the newspapers are at
least as full of stories about elephant depreda-
tions on agricultural land as about the threat to
the species.”

Barbara Blackmon, an art historian at the
University of San Diego, said she had just
reviewed a new college text on African art that
was shockingly full of demonstrably false
stereotypes tending to perpetuate notions of uni-
versally “primitive” or at best derivative artistic
styles and traditions. In highly sophisticated
societies like Benin there was very much a fine-
art tradition, she observed, with royal patronage
of master artists who were contemporaries of
Michaelangelo; the Medici collected Benin art.
On the other hand, validating the high-art claim

Ss

OF REPRESENTATION’

for Benin and similar kingdoms ought not to
denigrate “other equally beautiful but not palace
art.” Blackmon added.

An interesting question for the exhibit to
explore, she said, would be why, having been in
contact with literate civilizations, Benin’s rulers
chose to maintain a non-literate culture.

The “central role” of natural history muse-
ums in creating the ideological justification of
Western imperialism is an important aspect of
“the politics of representation,” and could be
included as part of the exhibit, several speakers
said. Henry Drewall, an art historian at the
Cleveland Museum, observed that the Field
Museum was established with the collections
assembled for the World’s Columbian Exposi-
tion in 1893, “where the people of the world
were put on display . . . and Dahomeyan Ama-
zons wete presented on the Midway.”

CONTENT SPECIALIST NAMED

Corinne Anne Kratz, research associate in the
department of sociology, University of Nairobi,
has been appointed content specialist on the
exhibit development team for the Africa Project
and curator in the department of anthropology.
She is currently a research fellow in the Smith-
sonian Institution’s department of anthropology.
Kratz earned her Ph.D. at the University of
Texas, Austin, in 1988 with a dissertation on
women’s initiation practices of the Okiek, high-
land hunter-gatherers in Kenya. She has a B.A.
in anthropology and religion and an M.A. in
anthropology from Wesleyan University
in Connecticut.

wearing tall bea

CNHM 8145

SOME HALLS ARE CLOSED
TO PREPARE FOR NEW EXHIBITS

number of exhibit halls have been

marked “closed for renovation” as the

Museum prepares major new installa-
tions of important collections. '

On the first floor, west wing, the Museum is
creating a dramatic new permanent exhibit on
“Diversity and Survival in the Animal King-
dom.” that will open in November 1991. Until
then, however, the following creatures have
gone into hibernation: “Mammals of Africa,”
“Mammals and Insects,” “Mammals of Asia”
(west half), “Mammals of America” (east half),
and “Birds of the World.” With the exception of
“Mammals of America,” which will not reopen
until 1992, all these displays will re-emerge as
part of the “Animal Kingdom” exhibit next
November.

The good news is that there are still birds
and animals to be found throughout the building
— from the imposing gorilla Bushman on the
ground floor, to a variety of species in the
Native American halls on the first floor, birds
of the Pacific islands in “Traveling the Pacific”
on the second floor, and many more.

On the east side of Stanley Field hall, the
space that housed “African Cultures” has been

Sepiember/October 1990

cleared and divided into two halves, The north
end will contain an exhibit yet to be determined,
and toward the end of September the “Sizes”
exhibit will move from its present location to
the south end of this space. “Sizes” will never
fully close, and by mid-October should be set-
tled into its new site; it will be revised and
expanded next year.

The artifacts from “African Cultures” will
be incorporated into a comprehensive new
exhibit on Africa that is scheduled to open in the
fall of 1992.

On the second floor, the “Fossil Shells and
Plants” hall has been closed and will be convert-
ed into much-needed storage space for the zool-
ogy collections. Some specimens from this
exhibit have been reabsorbed into the geology
collections, and others will reappear as part of
another major permanent exhibition, “Life Over
Time” tentatively scheduled to open in 1993.

The changes will be confusing and perhaps
annoying for many visitors, but patience will be
rewarded with new ways of looking at these
familiar displays.

Left, a carved tusk incorporat-
ing images of Europeans; inset
above, a p eque depicting three kings

caps and bead shirts.
Both items from Benin.

Paul McGrath

PROMOTION ANNOUNCED

eter R. Crane, associate curator of paleob-
P otany, has been promoted to the rank of
curator in the department of geology. Jonathan
Haas, vice president for collections and research,
said in announcing the appointment that Crane’s
studies of angiosperm evolution “distinguish him
among his colleagues as a significant force in
paleobotanical research.”

Crane serves as research associate with the
rank of professor in the department of geophysi-
cal sciences and lecturer in the committee on
evolutionary biology at the University of Chica-
go. He is associate editor of Paleobiology, asso-
ciate editor of the Botanical Journal of the Lin-
nean Society, and vice chairman of the Associa-
tion of North American Paleontological Societies.

PICNIC IN THE FIELD

fter a successful summer experiment, the

sandwich and snack pushcarts in the
ground-floor vending area have become “Picnic
in the Field,” a permanent part of the Museum’s
food-service offerings. Sandwiches currently on
the menu are smoked turkey, ham and cheese,
curried egg salad, and peanut butter and jelly,
and other varieties will be added. There are also
two kinds of quiche four days a week; fresh
fruit, bagels and cream cheese, a wide selection
of large muffins, frozen fruit-juice bars, and
three extremely rich kinds of brownies. Cold
mineral waters, juices, soft drinks, and yogurt
will also be available.

BENEFACTORS

Gathered at a luncheon hosted by President
Willard L. Boyd and Trustee Gordy Bent are
some of the most recent Field Museum Benefac-
tors, elected by the Board of Trustees in recogni-
tion of lifetime contributions to the Museum.
Seated, left to right, are Sam Rosenthal, Joan
Hamill, and Barbara Brown. Standing, left to
right, are Marie-Louise Rosenthal, Joan Bent, Mr.
Bent, Joan Webber, Corky Hamill, Susan Boyd,
Marion Lloyd, President Boyd, and Roger
Brown.

GN 85535.13

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—_——— “ee
eee

CRAFTS OF ALASKA’S INDIANS

—_——

bjects of recent manufacture but ancient
tradition are featured in a new exhibition
of crafts made by the Athapaskan Indians
of interior Alaska. The Athapaskans are a
formerly remote people who, despite 200 years of con-
tact with the outside world, still occupy their traditional
lands and retain a lifestyle based on hunting and fishing.

The exhibition opens September 22. A special
Members’ Evening showing on September 26, from 5
to 8 p.m., includes a half-hour lecture in Simpson The-
ater by James VanStone, curator of North American
archaeology and ethnology.

Many of the objects on display reflect the Atha-
paskan past; others, their modern culture. The birch-
bark baskets, beaded necklaces, gloves, and moc-
casins, and fur-trimmed coats in the exhibit
were commissioned from local craftspeople
in the 1980s. Some of the items were worn
at potlatch ceremonies, an age-old ritual that
is still the most significant social and spiri-
tual event in Indian life.
ove Additional objects from the Muse-
um’s collections illustrate the history and
craft traditions of the Athapaskans. The
: craft business, a major source of income for
F modern Athapaskans, enables participation
in today’s cash economy. Still, the work of
F the craftspeople expresses Athapaskan spiri-

tual traditions to the outside world.

FMNH 109343

eR
— =

WHO’D A THOUGHT IT

Improvisation in
African-American quiltmaking

fashioned by African Americans shows

the influence of improvisation, a vital
force behind the traditions of Black African art
forms. Quilting traditions are passed and modi-
fied from generation to generation, and Eli Leon,
the exhibit’s curator, says the line is short and
direct to the quiltmaking traditions of the
African-American slaves. “Who'd a Thought It”
runs from October 20 through January 6.

A n exhibit of 24 brilliantly-patterned quilts

Triple image of an anonymous 19th century
improvisationsal African-American quilt.

— and monuments built by their Mayan ancestors.

“Craftwork is very much a part of contemporary
Athapaskan culture,” VanStone said. “This exhibit
emphasizes the vigor of contemporary Indian crafts and
the extent of their roots in the past.”

VanStone commissioned William E. Simeone, an
American anthropologist living in Alaska, to assemble
this collection of modern crafts in the early 1980s. In
consultation with members of
the Athapaskan communi-
ties, Simeone first started
buying readily available ;
items such as baskets and *
moccasins from local stores
or from the craftspeople
themselves; a second phase
of acquisition required more “4
elaborate pieces to be commis- 4
sioned, such as chief’s garments
and tools for working with animal
skins and wood.

FMNH 109343

ANCIENT:
AMID MAYAN
RUINS

compelling photo essay by Cy Lehrer of Tucson reveals the lives
of people in Guatemala and the Mexican states of Chiapas and
Yucatan — people who live amid the ruins of magnificent temples
The exhibition

sensitively contrasts the images of eleven major Mayan ruins with sponta-
neous, candid, and sometimes ironic scenes of today’s street life in the
vicinity. The work is part of a series of photo projects which reflect
Lehrer’s fascination with the ways in which ancient civilizations estab-
lished their presence and left their mark, and with the people who now
pursue their lives in the aura of these awesome monuments to past glory.
The exhibit opens October 6 and runs thorugh February 3.

Orn sO

Ag ; it '
~ es f i
oY a a

Gideon Foli Alorwoyie, a native of
Ghana, kicks off the World Music
Festival for September/October with
performances of drumming and
dancing. He was Chief Master
Drummer of the Ghana Dance
Ensemble.

“1
MUSIC MAN

SIGN ME UP

OF Individual -one year $30.00 ( Family -one year $35.00
©) Individual -two years $55.00 id Family -two years $65.00
(Family membership includes two adults, children 18 and
under or grandchildren 18 and under)
“J Student/Senior -one year $25.00 (Individual only. I.D. required)

(1 Please send me information on the Museum's support groups.
New Members only. This is not a renewal form.

Name
Address

City

State

Home phone

Apt #

Zip

Business phone

O

TOP OF
THE WORLD

GOOD NEIGHBORS

Once again the Field Museum’s Community
Outreach Program brings together craftspeo-
ple and performers from Chicago's varied
ethnic communities for Neighbors Night, the
second annual celebration of the city’s cul-
tural diversity. There will be demonstrations
of Mexican, Chinese, and Native American
follk dancing, Filipino martial arts, the roots
of the blues in African music, children’s
games from South America, Native Ameri-
can finger-weaving and moccasin-making,
African puppetry, staff-carving, and doll-
making, and much more. Museum staff will
write your name in Egyptian hieroglyphs,
take you behind the scenes of research on
birds, show you how to make a fossil rub-
bing, dress you in a Hawaiian pareu, and
take you on a time trek into the Museum's
early history.

Of special interest in connection with
the Museum's new exhibit on African-Ameri-
can quiltmaking, Maxine Gulley of Chicago
will demonstrate quilting and display a 100-
year-old family quilt near the elephants in
Stanley Field Hall. And Roberto Valadez
will demonstrate the art of Mexican mural-
ism as he involves you in the making of a
Neighbors Night mural. Valadez, formerly a
student at Benito Juarez High School, now
works with Aurelio Diaz completing the

murals on the Ashland Avenue exterior of
the school building.

Museum President Willard L. Boyd and
several staff members of the Museum's
department of education visited Juarez High
in June to observe the work of student mural-
ists who are painting natural-history murals
in the school’s classroom corridors under the
direction of art teacher Peg Unger and earth
sciences teacher Lee Mishkin. Here, senior
Rich Hernandez puts the finishing three-
dimensional touches on Tyrannosaurus rex.

GN85486

An exclusive preview of original oil paintings
and watercolors by John James Audubon and
his son, John Woodhouse Audubon, never
before exhibited in Chicago, will benefit the
Field Museum Library. Included in the show-
ing at the Douglas Kenyon Gallery, 1357 N.

Wells St., Chicago, are personal effects such
as J.J. Audubon’s wild turkey seal ring and
his death mask. Reception sponsored by
Friends of the Library. For tickets, at $25 per
person, call Heidi Bloom at (312) 322-8874.

Elaine Bernstein, a veteran traveler in Tibet,
offers a slide-lecture and guides visitors
through the Museum’s collections from Tibet
and Bhutan. “Tibet Today” is one of many free
weekend programs offered by the Education
Department.

¥
iT) =7

1( 0/27 ee ae 5 : K

44/4 ?O41A
MIDNIGHT SPECIAL ()/ 3 & | A

EASTERN MUSES

Fan Wei-tsu performs on the sheng, a Chi-
nese zither, as part of the World Music Festi-
val. Also on today’s program is Douglas
Ewart playing the Japanese bamboo flute.
World Music Festival programs are offered
every weekend at Field Museum.

_———- 7 7 —

c* L/ET
SAVE ETE 1E

‘PACIFIC SPIRITS’
OPENS
NOVEMBER 10

More than 600 magnificent ceremonial, rit-
ual, and art objects from the Museum's
world-renowned Pacific collections will be
displayed in “Pacific Spirits: Life, Death,
and the Supernatural,” the second and final
part of the Museum's $4.2-million perma-

ECO- VOYAGEUR

Roger D. Stone, vice president of the
World Wildlife Fund and author of The
Voyage of the Sanderling, lectures on his
13,000-mile voyage studying the ecology
of the Atlantic coast, from Maine to Rio,
at 2 p.m. Tickets are $5 general, $3 for

Diane Alexander White GN 85580.31

Camping out in the Museum has become nent exhibit on the natural history and cul- members. A book-signing will follow the
a hot-ticket item this season. This is the tures of the Pacific islands. The exhibit lecture. Call (312) 322-8854.

third Family Overnight, where you can opens November 10. There will be pre-

roam the Museum, take part in special views for members of the Museum Novem- =
activities, watch a late movie, enjoy a ber 7 and 8, and a teachers’ preview = oe ;
midnight snack and Sunday morning November 26 (call 922-9410, ext. 351 for

breakfast. Then you'll be in a good posi- an invitation). A special lecture, “Masks of

tion to watch the runners in the Chicago the Spirit,” by Lawrence E. Sullivan, a Har- The Chicago Bears
Old Style Marathon speeding by. Tickets vard University expert on religious masks, &

are $30 per adult, $25 per child (age 16 will be given at 2 p.m. November 10; for Field Museum present:
and under). Call (312) 322-8854. tickets ($5 general admission and $3 for

members), call (312) 322-8854. FIELD GOAL

ae

Half-Price

Admission to Field Museum for Bears Fans
on Game Day!

Present your Bears ticket at Field Museum
and receive a “Field Goal” ticket, entitling
you to half-price admission and free readmis-
sion to Field Museum on game day.

Come early, avoid the traffic, and see the
wonders of the world! While you're at Field
Museum, you can relax and dine at our
McDonald's restaurant or at Picnic in the
Field, our new deli pushcart.

| Tour of Turkey
deparls toda

HOME SCHEDULE

_ SEAITIE
"MINNESOTA
GREEN BAY
_ LOS ANGELES (RAMS)
OPENDATE

HELD MUSEUM

THE SMART WAY TO HAVE FUN.

FAR AFIELD

ANCIENT EGYPT
IN MODERN COMFORT

IT’S BACK!

Colorado
River
rafting tour

may 24

ine Me
1991

Egypt, traveling up the Nile to Aswan by

luxury yacht, leaves Chicago February
25, returning March 17. This is an unrivaled
opportunity to experience Egypt, including
many sights not seen by most tourists, in the
company of two knowledgeable Egyptologists
— with first-class transit, accommodations, and
dining throughout.

The tour begins in Cairo with four nights at
the five-star Mena House Oberoi (pyramid-view
rooms in the garden wing). Day trips take us to
the pyramids at Giza; Saqqgara, the vast necrop-
olis of ancient Memphis where the Step Pyra-
mid of 3d Dynasty King Djoser has stood for
5,000 years; Saladin’s Citadel and the mosques
and bazaars of Islamic Cairo, along with the
5th-century churches of Coptic Cairo and

: fabulous 21-day archaeological tour of

THE GREAT BARRIER REEF

arine life of the Great Barrier Reef, the

largest coral reef system on Earth, is the
focus of a three-week tour in November in the
company of Dr. Harold K. Voris, curator in the
department of zoology. In addition to giving
shipboard lectures on marine life, reef forma-
tion, and ocean ecology, Dr. Voris, who is an
avid snorkeler, will accompany your underwa-
ter explorations. '

We fly from Los Angeles to Port Moresby
in Papua New Guinea, where we board Society
Expeditions’ World Discoverer to cruise the
Coral Sea. Day excursions provide opportuni-
ties to spot monitor lizards on Lizard Island;
rare birds and tree kangaroos at Cairns; din-
goes, wallabies, and “brumbies” on the sand at
Fraser Island; and wombats, emus, and koalas
along the Clarence River. We'll also see
ancient Aboriginal rock paintings and the stag-
ing area for the Battle of the Coral Sea at Whit-
sunday Island, before visiting Sydney’s Opera
House, the natural history museum, and the
Royal Botanic Garden. Last stop is a tour of
historic Tasmanian villages and caves.

The three-week trip, November 7 — 24,
1990, costs from $5,940 to $8,980 per person.
International air add-on from Los Angeles is
$1,400 and domestic air from Chicago is $300.

[eee eR a ee ae aa)

HISTORICAL SOCIETY EXHIBIT
The founding of Field Museum is featured in the new Chicago Historical
Society exhibit “A City Comes of Age: Chicago in the 1890s.” The
exhibit explores the “creative city-building” that made Chicago the lead-
ing city of the inland empire. In addition to the Field Museum, this peri-
od included the development of the Art Institute, the University of
Chicago, the Chicago Symphony, the Chicago Public Library, the New-
berry Library, and the Armour Institute (IIT). The exhibition, which dis-
plays a recreation of an early Field Museum exhibit on Native Ameri-
cans, opens October 24 and runs through July 15.

September/October 1990

Egypt’s oldest synagogue; and the Institute of
Mashrabeya, where Egyptian artists work in tra-
ditional Arabesque-style design in furniture and
interior decoration.

Transferring to the luxurious chartered 58-
passenger yacht M/S Nile Sovereign for eleven
nights, we cruise the Nile to visit pyramids,
tombs, and catacombs at Meidum, Beni Hasan,
and Tuna el-Gebel. The columned ruins of Her-
mopolis and the massive statues of Thoth at
Ashmounien are nearby. (All sightseeing 1s by
private deluxe motorcoach.)

At Mallawi we rejoin the yacht and sail to
Tel “El Amarna and the archaeological site of
the capital city of Akhenaton and Nefertiti, then
on to Abydos, traditional center of worship for
the cult of Osiris, god of the afterlife. At Den-
dera, the Ptolemaic temple dedicated to Hathor,
the goddess of love, has marvelous bas-reliefs
of Queen Cleopatra and her son Caesarion
extending from the crypt to the roof.

The weekend of March 9-10 will be spent
on the West Bank exploring ancient Thebes and
the Valley of the Kings, with Saturday evening
at the spectacular sound and light show at the
Temple of Karnak. A more contemplative look
at Karnak and Luxor is scheduled for Monday,
and there will be a reception at Chicago House
in Luxor. Tuesday brings us to the Ptolemaic
temples at Edfu dedicated to the falcon god
Horus, then back to the yacht for a cruise to the
river town of Kom Ombo and on to Aswan,
where the Temple of Isis has been moved from
the now-submerged island of Philae and recon-
structed stone by stone on nearby Agilkia
Island. From Agilkia we sail by felucca to
Kitchner Island, now a lush botanical garden, to
the hilltop mausoleum of the Aga Khan, and to
Sehal Island. After a night at the Aswan Oberoi

Hotel, we cross the
Nile by felucca and
take a camel ride to
St. Simeon Monastery
and the rock tombs at
Qubbet el-Hawa.

A morning flight
takes us to Lake Nass-
er and Abu Simbel,
where the colossal
temples of Ramses If
and Queen Nefertari
were carved out of the
cliff and raised more
than 200 feet to avoid
the rising water
behind the High Dam.

Back in Cairo,
from a base at the
Semiramis Interconti-
nental Hotel with
Nile-view rooms, we
delve into the exten-
sive collections of the
Egyptian Museum of
Antiquities which
houses the treasures
of Tutankhamun.

Our guides throughout will be Frank J.
Yurco and Ismail M. Aly. Frank is an Egyptolo-
gist with long experience in Egypt and with
Egyptian collections in the Chicago area,
including those of Field Museum, where he was
Egyptology consultant for the development of
the “Inside Ancient Egypt” exhibit. Ismail is a
native of Cairo and has been an inspector of
antiquities since 1977, an official tour guide
since 1981, and has led all Field Museum tours
in Egypt since 1985.

MAKE YOUR OWN FOSSILS

any fossils are just an image of a crea-
M ture, not the actual creature itself, and
most are made of minerals that didn’t
belong to the original animal or plant. Some-
times the creature is slowly replaced by miner-
als. Other times a cavity that is left behind by a
creature is filled by the minerals. As mud and
sand are turned to stone, the little pieces of life
that were in them are turned to stone too. These
are the fossils that we find.
Much of the Chicago region is covered by

material, called glacial drift, that was left
behind by the glaciers. Underneath the drift is
bedrock, layers of rock that often contain fos-
sils. Fossils are common in many of the rock
formations in the Chicago area. These fossils
can be used to determine the ages of the rocks
and the environments in which they were
formed.

To make your own fossil, you'll need:

+ Plaster of Paris;

e An aba to “fossilize,” like a shell or bone;

OF

* Fine bricklayer’s sand;

e Water; and

* A clean styrofoam meat tray.

Put a layer of damp sand into the meat tray.
The sand should be about 1 cm_ thick (a little
less than half an inch). Place the “fossil” object
into the sand making sure it will leave a good
clear impression. Remove the object from the sand.

Mix up the plaster of Paris according to the
package directions. You’ll need one to two cups

of plaster for each “fossil.” While it’s still liq-
uid, pour the plaster over the sand. Let the
whole thing set completely. Then lift the plaster
cast off the sand.

You now have fossil evidence of the shell

or bone, but the actual object is gone.
— Text: Peter Laraba
— Illustrations: Wade Wittscheck

A 110651

Paul McGrath

Paul McGrath

Paul MeGralh

KNOCK ON ANY DOOR...

espite bad weather and downtown street
closings, some 8,000 members and guests

] 3
Soleetitceny # Abie explored the Museum’s byways as the doors
in anthropology, were thrown open for the 39th annual Members

demonstrates work :
with potsherds, left; Night on June 22.
below, Samuel John-
son, a technical assis-
tant in zoology, intro-
duces visitors to a pet
Hercules beetle.

Paul MeGrath

Barbara Becker, co-
developer of the new
“Animal Kingdom”
exhibit, helps kids
make pin-on butions
with images of their
favorite animals.

Paul MoGrath

Robert Inger, left,
curator of amphibians
and reptiles, with a
few of the latter; at
right, Michele
Calhoun, reference
librarian, displays
photo album of
Akeley expedition to
East Africa, 1906, and
other volumes
illustrating the
Museum‘s history.

Diane Alexander W!

John Flynn, associate
curator of geology,
describes finding fos-
sils 18-30 million
years old, in South
America; at right,
sons and neighbors of
Robert and Dorothy
Vinson size things up.

Paul McGrath

Leo Naway of Sapi
village, at center
above, identifies for
Robert L. Welsch,
right, items in photos
taken in Sapi by A.B.
Lewis in 1909,

At right, a Sissano
woman in Nimas Vil-
lage making a hand
net (tiv) of nylon
string, 1990; at far
right, a Malol woman
making a net using
the same technique
but with pandanus
fiber string, 1909,

RETURN TO NEW GUINEA

(Continued from Page 1)

using four-by-five-inch glass plate negatives.
(Almost 1,600 of these survive in Field Muse-
um’s Photo Archives.) He was one of the first
anthropologists to use photography as a scientif-
ic research tool.

In addition to his collection and pho-
tographs, Field Museum still preserves his
research diary and other expedition field notes,
which capture in words what daily life was like
in the villages he visited. (Lewis’s diary is soon
to be published by the Museum.)

So Albert B. Lewis had been very success-
ful the first time out, But would we be, too,
when we followed him fo the north coast?

Since 1987 we have been researching the
Lewis Collection and its accompanying pho-
tographs and documents. For the past year and
a half, our research has been supported by the
National Science Foundation (the NSF), Wal-
green Company, Northwestern University, and
Field Museum.

As magnificent as the Lewis Collection
truly is, there is much that remains unknown
about what these artifacts meant to people living
on the coast at the turn of the century. And as
valuable as his field notes and photographs are
in depicting life in Lewis’s day, much is still
unknown about how these objects were made,
used, and traded between communities.

To learn more about these artifacts and the
elaborate system of trade they give testimony to,
we wanted to go back to New Guinea now,
while people living there still remember the way
life used to be in Lewis’s day.

When we first applied to the NSF to fund
our research, we asked for money to help us
with: laboratory work at Field Museum as well
as with support for new field work in Papua

John Terrell

Seplember/October 1990)

A.B. Lewis 31730

RL. Welsch

New Guinea. The scientists who reviewed our
proposal liked our plan to study the Lewis Col-
lection at the Museum. But they raised the
objection that going back to New Guinea in the
footsteps of A. B. Lewis would be a waste of
time and money. They stated confidently that it
was too late to do the field work we proposed.
They were sure that after three generations of
economic development and “intense accultura-
tion” the kinds of artifacts Lewis collected had
disappeared long ago and been forgotten.

A revised proposal to the NSF, leaving out
the field work component, was successful. But
perhaps because we stubbornly refused to
believe that everything from Lewis’s day is lost
forever, we asked for (and luckily received) two
airfares to Papua New Guinea to find out if at
least older people on the coast still remember
something about life at the turn of the century.
And with a grant from Walgreen Company that
helped defray our living expenses in Papua New
Guinea for two months, we left Chicago in late
March on the 1990 Walgreen Expedition to the
West Sepik.

In Papua New Guinea

On arriving in Papua New Guinea, we spent
two weeks in the bustling capital of Port Mores-
by. We wanted to confer with our colleagues at
the National Museum and the University of
Papua New Guinea; we also had to obtain per-
mission from the Institute of Papua New Guinea
Studies, which coordinates research throughout
the country.

It was reassuring to talk over our research
plans with museum staff, university anthropolo-
gists, and Papua New Guinea students, all of
whom felt our first NSF reviewers had been far

too pessimistic. The real test, however, came
when we reached Aitape at last.

Lewis had chosen Tumleo, one of four
small islands lying a few miles from Aitape, as

A.B, Lewis 31773

Double outrigger sailing canoe at Sapi Village on
Tumleo Island that brought A.B. Lewis from
Aitape in 1909,

his first destination on the north coast. In 1909,
Tumleo was renowned in the Aitape region as
an important trade center and the main producer
of earthenware pots for the whole coast. Fol-
lowing Lewis’s lead, we made Tumleo the first
destination on our expedition too.

Outfitted with cameras, notebooks, and an
album of photographs, we left Aitape for Tum-
leo on a small outboard-powered dinghy owned
by some fishermen from neighboring Ali island.
They put us ashore at Tumleo on the same
beach at Sapi village where A. B. Lewis had
first stepped ashore in 1909. We found the
beach lined with small outrigger canoes that
looked virtually identical to those Lewis had
photographed, except that some today are paint-
ed with enamel to protect the dugout hulls and
add some color to the wood.

You can easily imagine the questions run-
ning through our minds as we stepped ashore on
this beautiful white sandy beach where more
than a dozen women and children were staring
at us and wondering who we were.

After introducing ourselyes to some of the
young women and children, we saw a man
painting his canoe a short way down the beach.
This was Leo Naway, who is in his 60s. Like
most of the older people we met, Leo was pre-
disposed to be helpful when he learned we were
Americans because he remembered the warmth
of the American servicemen stationed on Tum-
leo toward the end of World War II.

After talking with Leo for a while, we
showed him the pictures in our photo album.
He studied each of them intently. He recog-
nized every object in the album and told us their
local names in Tumleo language. He was
especially fascinated by the photos Lewis had
taken of Sapi village. He immediately recog-
nized the men’s cult house, or haus tambaran,
in one of Lewis’s photos. These houses have
not been built for more than 50 years. He
proudly showed it to his 32-year-old son, who
had never seen one before.

The women on the other hand were espe-
cially interested in Lewis’s photos of earthen-
ware pots. They brought out recently made
examples to show us that pots are still regularly
made. They told us where they get the three dif-
ferent kinds of clay and how they make their
pots. And later, when we were taken around the
island to see the other villages, they showed us
similar pots in every stage of manufacture,
including about 40 pots being stored in one
woman’s attic.

Even we were surprised to learn that Tum-
leo women still trade their pots all along the
coast, exchanging them for smoked fish, vegeta-
bles, and most importantly for sago, the palm
starch that is still the staple food in every village
around Aitape. Although sago can nowadays be
bought for money at Aitape’s outdoor market,

Tumleo people still prefer to exchange their
pots directly for their sago.

When we returned to the Aitape mainland,
we left by double outrigger canoe, much as
Lewis had done 80 years before — except that
our canoe had an outboard motor, which makes
these large canoes a safer form of transport dur-
ing the stormy northwest monsoon.

There are outboard motors and other kinds
of consumer goods in all the villages we visited
along the coast. But while many things have
changed since Lewis’s day, we were amazed at
how much has stayed the same.

Not only did people along the coast recog-
nize what we showed them in our photo albums,
but they also still make, use, and trade nearly
every kind of object that Lewis had brought
back to Chicago. Again and again, on seeing
our pictures people went into their homes to
show us modern examples of the very same
things. And we could see the more important
local crafts, such as fish traps, baskets, canoes,
and paddles, being made around nearly every
other household.

Everyone we met is proud of their tradi-
tional handicrafts and took great delight in
showing us how to make the objects shown in
our photo albums. They were as puzzled as we
were at our NSF reviewers’ assertions that tra-
ditional crafts had surely disappeared over the
past 80 years. So much so, that in Sissano vil-
lage, 30 miles down the coast from Tumleo, the
people decided we should bring back some
examples to Chicago and to the National Muse-
um in Port Moresby so that we could prove that
their traditional handicrafts are alive and well.
And they invited us to come back to study their
material culture and daily lives.

Lewis’s photos of daily life in 1909 were
especially popular in the villages. We were
amazed at the wealth of detail they could identi-
fy in these old pictures. For example, in one
photo they could even tell us what was being
cooked by a Sissano woman in her Tumleo pot:
a particular kind of green leaves called balbal.

Lewis’s photographs seem inadvertently to
have helped us in at least one way we had not
anticipated. Because we brought photos that
our predecessor had made in their villages long
ago, people interpreted our visit as a return to
the Aitape coast after a long absence. We were
not visiting these villages for the first time, but
Field Museum was renewing 4q relationship that
had been dormant for many years. Karl
Schmidt’s prescription for success had worked,
and by following in the footsteps of A. B. Lewis
we, too, had been remarkably successful.

Our colleagues at the National Museum
and the University of Papua New Guinea were
pleased by the results of our brief reconnais-
sance survey when we returned to Port Mores-
by. They have agreed to collaborate fully with
our project in the future. If all works according
to our new field research plans, staff from the
National Museum and students from the Uni-
versity of Papua New Guinea will work with us
on the north coast.

The future of the A. B. Lewis Project is
once again in the hands of the National Science
Foundation. A new proposal for field research
has been sent off to Washington. But this time
we don’t think anyone can claim there is noth-
ing left worth studying on the north coast.

Our scientific objectives haven’t changed
although our recent trip raised more questions
than we had before we departed. The A. B.
Lewis Project wants to show that the Lewis
Collection’s artifacts, photographs, and unpub-
lished documents are a rich and largely unstud-
ied resource that can be used systematically to
study the remarkable social, economic, and lin-
guistic diversity found in Melanesia.

Specifically, we want to continue our study
of how and in what ways the traditional manu-
facture and trade of material culture have
shaped the diverse cultures of Papua New
Guinea. This time not just here at Field Muse-
um, but in the field.

L, Ashbaugh

L. Ashbauah

A PROPER NAME, AT LAST

By Philip Hershkoyitz

Curator Emeritus, Mammals

onkeys are disappearing from the wild
M faster than their forest habitats are
being diminished, altered, or
destroyed. The Brazilian Atlantic rain forest
that once spread almost unbroken from coast to
interior mountainsides had been alive with the
call and clatter of myriad monkeys. Now, frag-
ments of once widespread populations exist pre-
cariously in isolated sanctuaries of mostly sec-
ondary forest, and in remnants of original rain
forest on private lands. Today, one can travel
for miles through unprotected secondary forest
without seeing or hearing a single monkey.

During the first few decades of this and the
whole of the last century, nearly everything col-
lected in the rich tropical forests and studied in
the world’s great museums proved to be new to
science. Thereafter, it was believed, few large,
conspicuous animals remained to be discovered.
Currently, the greatest concern is for preserva-
tion of the vanishing, mostly degraded forests
and their impoverished faunas. Finding an
unknown large mammal, especially a monkey,
in well trafficked and exploited habitats, would
be quite unexpected.

In the search for unknown or little known
species of mammals or other large animals, bet-
ter results may be had in museums. Because of
a perennial shortage of specialists, many of the
stored specimens can wait years, even centuries,
for recognition as undescribed species or, as
sometimes happens, for disentanglement from
misidentification with known species.

In a classic monograph on the bats and
monkeys he collected in Brazil between 1817
and 1820, the German zoologist Johann von
Spix of the Munich Natural History Museum
described a blackish titi monkey (at right, bot-
tom), the size of a large house cat, and named it
Callithrix gigot. The artist commissioned to
make a portrait of the mounted individual mis-
takenly used fora model an unknown blond titi,
and cartelessly captioned the painting Callithrix
gigot. The dark titi, originally from the coast of
southern Bahia, is still preserved in the Munich
Museum. The mislabeled blond titi was not
mentioned by Spix and the whereabouts of the
mounted specimen is unknown.

As misfortune would have it, the dark titi
Spix described in 1823 as Callithrix gigot had
already been named Callithrix melanochir three
years earlier by another zoologist. The zoologi-
cal rule of priority required that this become the

Above left, a lagoon fish trap collected by Lewis
at Malol in 1909; above right, a similar trap col-
lected at Sissano in 1990. Below, Sissano fish

baskets: at left, a 1909 accession; at right, 1990.

recognized name. Doubly misfor-
tunate, the same rule of priority
also affected the generic designa-
tion of Callithrix, which had first
been proposed for a different kind
of animal. To avoid duplicate use
of the same name, titi monkeys
became Callicebus. Finally. the
blond titi must also have a new
name — based, if possible, on an
actual specimen with good data.

Are Any Left in the Wild?

After Spix got his blond specimen in north-
western Bahia in 1819, eight more were collect-
ed in 1903 for the British Museum (Natural His-
tory) by a French naturalist, Alphonse Robert,
and one for the Field Museum in 1913 by an
American, R.H. Becker. All specimens were
taken in the same general region now densely
populated, and all were misidentified as gigot or
melanochir. Whether or not the blond titi still
exists in the Atlantic rain forest of Brazil
remains to be investigated.

Extant or not, the very distinct northern
Bahian blond titi still needs a legitimate name of
its own. Accordingly, one of the British Muse-
um specimens, the best preserved and most rep-
resentative of those available, was chosen as
type and described under the new name Callice-
bus personatus barbarabrownae in a recent
publication of the Field Museum’s scientific
journal, Fieldiana: Zoology (No. 55).

The scientific name for this handsome
monkey, reconstructed and portrayed as live (at
right, above) by staff artist Zoriga Dabich, is in
honor of Field Museum Associate Barbara E.
Brown. Her many valuable contributions to the
scientific programs of this institution include
full participation in two Museum-sponsored
zoological expeditions into the Brazilian
Atlantic rain forest. But those were made before
the history of the blond titi became known.

Art: Zoriga Dabich
Photo: John Weinstein Neg, No, 93868

AN UPPER
EOCENE
MUSHROOM

mber from the La Toca mine in the northern Dominican Republic

has yielded the fossil of a nearly complete mushroom, with its

gills intact, that dates to the upper Eocene period, 40 million
years ago. The fossil was discovered by George O. Poinar, Jr., an ento-
mologist at the University of California at Berkeley; it was identified by
Rolf Singer, research
associate in the Field
Museum’s department
of botany, as belong-
ing to a previously
unknown genus, with
affinities to the pre-
sent-day genus Copri-
nus. The fossil was
assigned the name
Coprinites domini-
cana. The researchers
reported in Science
that C. dominicana “is
the earliest known
gilled ‘mushroom,’ the
first fossil fleshy agar-
ic determinable, and
the only known fossil
‘mushroom’ from the
tropics.”

U. of Calif, Berkeley

September/October 1990

The character
of Japan.

Leaying an indelible impression
moves business in a way that nothing
else can. One that is molded by your
own hand so that no one else can do

| it with quite the same panache.

That's what can make all the
difference in an airline. And that’s
what we're doing at United.

We're now the number one
carrier across the Pacific, Going
over and back more than any other
airline, I guess you could say we're
making our mark,

United. Come fly the friendly
skies,

United is proud to be the official
airline of the Field Museum's
“Traveling the Pacific” exhibit.

TOKYO" OSAKA* HONGKONG « SEOUL" TAIPET* SYDNEY“ MELBOURNE * BENING * SHANGHAT* AUCKLAND= SING APORE* MANILA * BANGKOK