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NEW SPECIES OF LARGE
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In the Field

March/April 1994

THE CAMBRIAN EXPLOSION:
EVOLUTION’S “BIG BANG’?

i

In the Field

March/April 1994

The Bulletin of the Field Museum

2

1893-1993
For 100 years, the
The Field Museum Field Museum and
Exploring the Park District
The Earth And Its have been serving
People Chicago’s publics.

Special exhibits, lec-
tures, courses and
field trips, and free
programs for
Museum visitors

9-8 9

“Own A Bone,” the
campaign to solicit
public sponsorship
of Brachiosaurus,

brings in $135,000.

VISIONES DEL PUEBLO:

LATIN AMERICAN FOLK ART

A spectacular exhibit of 250 items from 17
countries of Latin America opens April 15 in
the South Gallery. “Visiones del Pueblo”
explores the roots of this artistic tradition in
Spain, Portugal, West Africa, and the
ancient cultures of Mesoamerica.

EXPEDITION FINDS TWO NEW
SPECIES OF LARGE DINOSAURS

By Ron Dorfman
Editor, In the Field

ix tons of fossil bones, representing

at least two new species of large

dinosaurs dating from the mid-Creta-

ceous period in northern Africa,

have arrived at the Field Museum
and are being prepared for display and study
later this year. The fossils were uncovered by
an expedition led by Paul Sereno, a Museum
research associate in geology and associate pro-
fessor of organismal biology and anatomy at
the University of Chicago.

“We found several new dinosaurs and the
remains of other vertebrates from approxi-
mately 135 million years ago,” Sereno said.
“The continent is very poorly known from this
period. So the question was: What would an
African animal fauna look like? And the ani-
mals we found give us some clues to that. The
Sahara has lots of dinosaur-age rocks. There’s a
lot to be learned there.”

At the time, Africa was an island continent
separated from South America and drifting
toward Eurasia; the Atlantic Ocean was grow-
ing, putting ever more distance between popu-
lations of plants and animals that had once
shared a single southern continent.

Sereno said the expedition recovered a
large herbivorous sauropod dinosaur and a
large carnivore similar to Allosaurus or Tyran-
nosaurus, as well as turtles, crocodiles, fish,
and a few other animals.

A film crew from Museum trustee Bill
Kurtis’s public-television series The New
Explorers accompanied the expedition and is
preparing a documentary for broadcast in October.

Sereno hopes to be able to announce sig-
nificant scientific findings in conjunction with
the broadcast. Aside from being a wunderkind
of dinosaur paleontology — at 36, he is world-
famous for finding important new dinosaurs
nearly everywhere he looks — Sereno is a lead-
ing researcher in dinosaur systematics, the
effort to develop a reliable evolutionary tree for
the class as a whole.

The dinosaurs were discovered in a remote
desert area of Niger, a land-locked country in
northwest Africa. The logistics were daunting,
involving transport of personnel, equipment,
and supplies by air, sea, and land to Niger,
securing necessary permissions, carefully
wrapping each bone in a plaster cast, and cart-
ing the treasure back to Chicago.

Sereno first inspected one site in the area
in 1990. “I had joined an expedition going into
the area on a ten-day trip, and on Day 7 we
found this incredible site, where you could
visually see six big sauropod skeletons at the
surface. The ground was low and savannah-
like, a rocky desert with soft areas and not a lot
of relief. Unless you’re really tuned in to the

desert you won't see readily identifiable land-
marks. But I had a satellite locator.” In an
homage to Elmer Riggs and Brachiosaurus,
Sereno excavated a thigh-bone and had himself
photographed lying next to it.

Thus armed, he set about assembling the
resources to revisit the site, and the expedition
left Chicago in September. Major funding was
provided by the Ronald McDonald Children’s
Charities, the David and Lucile Packard Foun-
dation, the National Geographic Society,
American Airlines, the Women’s Board of the
University of Chicago, and the Eppley Founda-
tion for Research, Inc.

“Once we were there we began working it
and sent out small parties to try to find other

sites,” Sereno said. “You
have to be tuned in to the
frequency of the local
guides and nomads, talk-
ing to them about things
they had seen that might
turn out to be fossil beds. . 4
You need to open your- &
self to the culture. It’s
hard for foreigners to do,
but I had a team that was
ready for that.

“We lived in a vil-
lage, an oasis town, and

(Continued on page 11)

THE ‘BIG BANG’
OF EVOLUTION?

By Matthew H. Nitecki
Department of Geology

eaders who follow science in such
publications as National Geo-
graphic and The New York Times
have learned recently of new
research that appears to narrow
the time frame for the “Cambrian explo-
sion,” described as the sudden
appearance of animal life in
virtually all the principal
taxonomic groups [phyla]
that we know today. Evi- {
dence from both fossils
and radiometric dating |
of rocks now suggests 9
that such an evolution- \¥
ary event, or series of ‘\@
events, occurred in a
mere five to ten million
years, some 530 million
years ago. Inevitably, this
rapid diversification has |, W
been labeled the “Big Bang” fe
of evolution. ie
But science — even, or =
perhaps especially, evolution- ve
ary biology — has its enthusi-
asms, and the very notion of an “explosion” of
life may be simply an artifact of science fash-
ion. What most paleontologists now see as a
relative abundance of data in sites such as the
Burgess Shale in Canada, Mazon Creek here in
Illinois, and others might as easily be inter-
preted, if the fashion were different, as local-
ized and fragmentary evidence from which no
grand conclusions should be drawn. It is still

)
ye

quite possible that Darwin was right, that evo-
lution is a gradual process not given to explo-
sive developments.

Eighteenth-century geologists and biolo-
gists had ignited a debate over the nature of the
earth’s history. The principal theoretical com-
bat came at the turn of the 19th century,
between the “catastrophists,” led by the French
zoologist and paleontologist Georges Cuvier,
and the “gradualists,” led by the British geolo-
gists James Hutton and Charles Lyell.

After years of conflict, at the time
when the young Charles Darwin
was beginning to think about
evolution, the gradualists
seemed to have won the

field.

By the mid-19th
- century, however, the catas-
trophists had begun to
rebound. An explosion of life
appeared to have occurred
during the Silurian period,
now dated at about 440 mil-
lion years ago, as evidenced
by geological formations con-
7 taining the fossils of numer-
ous skeletal animals; below that
geological boundary, there were
no fossils and there had presumably been no
life. But, Darwin wrote in The Origin of
Species (1859): “[I]f my theory be true, it is
indisputable that before the lowest Silurian
stratum was deposited, long periods elapsed, as
long as, or probably far longer than, the whole
interval from the Silurian age to the present
day; and that during these vast, yet quite
unknown, periods of time, the world swarmed

(Continued on page 10)

Story, Page 5

William Simpson,
collections manager
and chief preparator
of fossil vertebrates,
supervises the
unloading of six tons
of dinosaur bones
from the Sahara
expedition.

Cross-section of a
fossil stromatolite.
Stromatolites were
once thought to be
inorganic, but it is
now known that the
“rings” are layers of
bacteria and blue-
green algae as much
as 3.5 billion years
old.

SERVING CHICAGO’S PUBLICS |
THROUGH THE PARKS

By Willard L. Boyd
President, The Field Museum

ne hundred years ago, on June 2,
1894, the Field Columbian
Museum opened in Jackson Park.
The previous fall the Art Institute
of Chicago had moved to Grant
Park. In addition to furnishing sites, the South
Park District, with the approval of the Illinois
General Assembly, established a special real
estate tax for operating support of these two
museums.

Why this Park District-museum partner-
ship?

1. Museums in parks were considered an
integral part of urban park development world-
wide. Parks were conceived as places of learn-
ing as well as nature and recreation.

2. Along with schools and universities,
museums were seen as important centers of
learning for every Chicagoan.

3. Great museums could draw visitors to a
city seeking to be a world crossroads.

4. Tax support was necessary because
museums operate huge physical spaces which
are open every day of the year at low or no
charge.

One hundred years later nine superb muse-
ums are situated on park land and receive cru-
cial support from residential taxpayers and
commercial taxpayers who operate businesses
which are both local and international in scope.
In turn, the museums have developed a strong
base of private sector support and have
strengthened their sources of earned income,
creating a unique public/private sector partner-
ship from which Chicago benefits greatly.

Has this century-old park/museum partner-
ship served Chicago well? Is it a partnership
which can serve Chicago well in the future?
The answer to these broad policy questions
depends on the answers to more specific ques-
tions concerning how well the Museums are
serving their constituencies. Do these museums
serve the daily educational needs of Chicago
citizens? Do these museums also serve the
daily needs of Chicagoans by annually attract-
ing millions of visitors from outside Chicago’s
city limits? Is Chicago taxpayer support too
much?

How does one museum — the Field —
meet the daily educational needs of
Chicagoans? The Field is a center of learning
about the environment and about diverse cul-
tures. We must learn to protect our environ-
ments and respect our cultural differences. Liv-
ing together in Chicago, living together in a
shrinking world are issues vital to the future of
every Chicagoan.

In 1993, nearly 280,000 Chicago residents
visited the Museum. About 60% entered with-
out charge, including 94,000 Chicago students
who visited in school groups.

In an effort to go beyond the weekly free
day and free school visits, the Museum:

e Admits without charge all Chicago Park
District and other community groups;

e Distributes 50,000 free family passes to
Chicago children including 26,000 distributed
through Chicago Park District summer camps;

e Provides free use of facilities for meet-
ings of teachers and staff of the Chicago parks
and schools.

Free admission is only one aspect of the
Field’s efforts to serve Chicagoans. We also

March/April 1994

have an active outreach and educational pro-
gram. In 1993 we:

¢ Provided special programs for Chicago
schools both in the classroom and the Museum.
Currently approximately 25,000 Chicago stu-
dents in 390 school groups plan to use our edu-
cational material and visit the Africa exhibit
during African American Heritage Month, and
302 Museum programs served Chicago stu-
dents during Latino Celebracién month in the
fall of 1993.

* Conducted programs in 15 different
Parks located in eight Chicago neighborhoods
— Englewood, West Englewood, Auburn-Gre-
sham, South Chicago, South Shore, Near West
Side, Lower West Side (Pilsen), and Armour
Square (Chinatown);

¢ Conducted outreach in other community
centers in these eight neighborhoods involving
6,616 people;

¢ Provided staff training for Park District
personnel from all over the city;

¢ Provided teacher training for 1,053
Chicago teachers;

¢ Loaned 6,576 instructional materials to
5,347 borrowers in Chicago through our Harris
Extension program to reach more than 160,000
individuals. We provided staff training to
teachers and Park District personnel in the use
of these loan materials;

¢ Organized the Community Outreach Par-
ents Association;

¢ Held a Neighbors’ Night which invited to
the Museum the people in the communities
being directly touched by our outreach pro-
gram. We opened this evening to the entire city
of Chicago; 3,200 people attended.

This coming summer we plan to conduct a
“Field Naturalist in the Park” program.

In summary, the Field Museum and its
peer museums in the parks are city-wide family
and community centers. They are great places
for young people to “hang out.”

ll of the nine museums serve
Ace directly in many ways. Do

they also serve Chicago residents by
annually attracting millions of visitors from
outside the city limits? The Parks partnership
was created in 1894 to do precisely that as
Chicago sought to be the economic capital of
the Midwest and an international trading center.
Chicago was to be a unique city, not just an
overgrown prairie town.

One hundred years later Chicago is work-
ing hard to retain its position as a world class
city in a new century. Key to the city’s eco-
nomic strategy is drawing more visitors to the
city, as evidenced by the current development
of McCormick Place and Navy Pier, the quest
for a casino and theme park district, and the
hosting of the World Cup.

The nine museums on park land together
constitute the city’s largest visitor attraction.

March/April 1994
Vol. 65, No. 2

Editor:
Ron Dorfman

Art Director:
Shi Yung

Editorial Assistant:
Steven Weingartner

In the Field

They are known nationally and worldwide for
their excellence. Only New York City and
Washington, D.C. have museums of similar
stature. There are no comparable groups of
museums in California, Florida, and the South-
west.

Other areas may have convention centers,
casinos and stadiums, but our museums are a
distinctive Chicago hallmark of global renown.
They convey the image of an international city
which is urbane and safe to visit. Recently
ABC’s Nightline focused on how both New
York City and Los Angeles are now advertising
their cities in the image of their cultural institu-
tions following earthquakes, fires and crime.
This program presented an image of two urban
areas being “rescued” as tourist destinations by
their cultural institutions.

Because of the 100-year-old Park District
partnership, the museums-in-the-park are the
city’s number one tourist attraction. Standard
tourism economic indicators demonstrate that
the museums annually generate $350,000,000
for Chicago’s economy. The continuation of
this museum-Park District financial partnership
is essential. These museums must remain at the
forefront of the world’s museums if Chicago is
to be a spectacular international city in the 21st
century.

Are Chicago taxpayers being asked to pay
too much to support these museums? Chicago
taxpayers currently provide 23% of the operat-
ing costs of the nine park museums. Sixty-eight
percent of the tax is borne by commercial tax-
payers and 32% by residential taxpayers. The
tax on a typical Chicago homeowner is about
$21 per year. The balance of our funding comes
from private sector gifts and grants and from
admission and membership fees, shops and
restaurants.

Although this tax is an ever-decreasing
share of the museums’ revenue, it remains the
financial foundation for our operations. Heat-
ing, lighting, cleaning, repairing, and opening
the million square feet of the Field Museum
each day does not appeal to many donors.
Funds from other sources are often tied to spe-
cific programs. The Park District tax partner-
ship is the reason these museums directly serve
so many Chicago residents and are such a vital
factor in one of Chicago’s biggest industries—
tourism — which employs so many citizens.

Without this public sector investment,
these museums will decline. With this support
they will be able to play an even greater role in
providing learning experiences for every
Chicagoan and contributing enormously to the
vitality of Chicago’s economy.

All of the museums look forward to
another 100 years of serving Chicago’s publics
through the parks.

1893-1993

The Field Museum
Exploring

The Earth And Its
People

In the Field (ISSN #1051-4546) is published bimonthly by The Field Museum, Roosevelt Road at Lake Shore Drive,
Chicago IL 60605-2496. Copyright © 1994 The Field Museum. 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
necessatily reflect policy of The Field Museum. 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, The Field Museum, Roosevelt Rd. at Lake Shore Dr., Chicago, IL 60605-2496. Second class

postage paid at Chicago, Illinois.

BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION

PROGRAM GETS COORDINATOR

ENDY JACKSON recently arrived at the
Museum’s Center for Evolutionary
and Environmental Biology (CEEB)

to serve as coordinator of the Advanced Train-
ing Program in the Conservation of Biological
Diversity, a consortium of the Field Museum,
Brookfield Zoo, and the University of Illinois
at Chicago. The project, funded by the Mac-
Arthur Foundation, will bring to Chicago each
year a dozen young scientists from developing
countries for intensive training to help them
deal with emerging biodiversity problems in
their home countries. Jackson is a Ph.D. in
zoology who comes to the Museum from the
U.S. Agency for International Development,
where she spent two years as a Fellow spon-
sored by the American Association for the
Advancement of Science. There she served as
biodiversity advisor to the Office of Research,
and helped administer two research-grant pro-
grams for scientists from developing countries.

cw
e

JoHN TERRELL’s paper “Anthropology and
Adoption,” written with Judith Modell of
Carnegie-Mellon University, is being published
in March in the American Anthropologist. The
paper is a contribution of the Cooperative Kin-
ship & Adoption Project directed by Modell,
Terrell, who is curator of Oceanic archaeology
and ethnology, and Laura Litten of the Depart-
ment of Video at Columbia College.

€

JONATHAN Haas, the MacArthur Curator of
North American Anthropology and Archaeol-
ogy, and WInrFRED CREAMER, visiting assistant

curator in the Department of Anthropology,
have published Stress and Warfare Among the
Kayenta Anasazi of the Thirteenth Century
A.D. (Field Museum Press), a study of the
influence of warfare on political organization in
pre-contact Arizona. The authors speculate that
severe drought in the 12th century led to raids
and counter-raids for food. Kayenta communi-
ties gradually moved closer together physically
and socially in the early 13th century, building
common water reservoirs and common kivas.
The authors conclude that the two-pronged
threat of diminishing resources and increased
raiding led to a specific type of hierarchical
social organization by the mid-13th century.

€

Rosert L. WELSCH, visiting associate curator of
anthroplogy, has had his manuscript An Anthro-
plogist in Melanesia Before the Great War: The
Field Diaries of A.B. Lewis 1909-1913,
accepted for publication by the University of
Hawaii Press. This volume is a contribution of
the A.B. Lewis Project, a joint undertaking by
Welsch and JoHn TERRELL, curator of Oceanic
archaeology and ethnology. The volume will be
lavishly illustrated; the many artifact pho-
tographs were taken by the Museum’s Depart-
ment of Photography. Welsch returned to
Chicago in February from a ten-month field trip
to the north coast of Papua New Guinea, a con-
tinuation of the A.B. Lewis Project.

€

A detailed survey of 405 species of coffee
plants in Costa Rica includes scientific descrip-
tion of fifteen new species. The 340-page

ROLF SINGER, MYCOLOGIST, 87

olf Singer, a Field Museum research

associate in botany and for more

than half a century one of the

world’s leading figures in the study
of fungi, died January 18 at the age of 87.

It was Singer who first demonstrated that
tropical trees and mushrooms formed ectomy-
chorrizae, joint structures underground that are
vital to both organisms. The phenomenon was
well-known in temperate forests where it is a
keystone of forest management systems, so
Singer’s discovery had important implications
for conservation and management of tropical
forests. Singer had also done early work on
poisonous and hallucinogenic mushrooms.

“He totally changed how we look at fungi
— not just their classifi-
cation, but how they
function in tropical
forests,” said Gregory
Mueller, associate curator
of mycology and a pro-
tégé of Singer. “He docu-
mented in the Amazon
that many trees are totally
dependent on the Agari-
cales [mushrooms and
their relatives].”

Singer published his
first scientific papers at
age 16 and maintained an
active research and writ-
ing regimen until April
1993, coming to his
office at the Museum
twice a week and plan-

ning additional field Rolf Singer, 1906-1994

work in Central America. His principal unfin-
ished work is a treatise on the Boletes of Mex-
ico and Central America, a large group of edi-
ble, poisonous, and ectomychorrizal fungi. He
had finished four of a planned seven volumes,
and was working on the fifth and sixth, accord-
ing to Mueller, who said efforts would be made
to complete them posthumously.

After escaping Nazi Germany by skiing to
Austria, Singer went to Spain to do research in
the Pyrenees and was arrested by Spanish
authorities, but they released him to France
rather than hand him over to the Germans.
From that point on Singer led a nomadic aca-
demic life that took him to important positions
in Europe, Russia, and Central and South
America as well as to
Harvard, the Field
Museum, and the Uni-
versity of Illinois at
Chicago. As a result he
had perhaps the most
encyclopedic knowledge
of fungi in the world,
and was a catalyst for
cooperative international
research.

Singer’s numerous
books, including the
now-standard text Agari-
cales in Modern Taxon-
omy, and more than 300
journal articles were
written in six languages,
a facility that was some-
times disconcerting to
his colleagues. “Depend-

John Weinstein / GN86733.9

monograph on the coffee family (Rubiaceae)
by WILLIAM Burcer, curator of vascular plants,
and Charlotte M. Taylor of the Missouri Botan-
ical Garden has been published by Field
Museum Press as part of the Flora of Costa
Rica series in Fieldiana: Botany. Burger also
contributed 66 full-page drawings to the work.

€

Three Anthropology Department curators are
teaching University of Illinois-Chicago courses
this term. Bennet Bronson is presenting “Early
Technology and Material Culture”; Anna Roo-
sevelt is teaching “Environmental Archaeology
in the American Tropics” (a co-UIC/North-
western University class); and Charles Stanish
is offering “Archaeological Theory in Ancient
States.”

€

ANNA C. ROOSEVELT, curator of archaeology,
has been elected to the board of directors of the
American Association for the Advancement of
Science in Washington, D.C. The Association
publishes the journal Science and supports pro-
grams in education, ethics, and international
science, among others. Roosevelt has served as
an officer of the Anthropology Section of the
AAAS for several years.

Anna C. Roosevelt

ing on which he happened to be writing in at
the time,” Mueller said, “his conversation
would pick up in that language and it would be
a few minutes before he realized he was sup-
posed to be speaking English.” One of the lan-
guages he did not speak was Italian, Mueller
noted, but an Italian priest once stopped him on
the street to ask directions and a conversation
in Latin followed.

Singer sometimes fit the stereotype of the
absent-minded professor, coming to work
wearing two neckties or mismatched socks.
“He could set his glasses down and forget
where he’d put them,” Mueller said. “But he
could tell you all the circumstances of where
he found a particular mushroom in 1952.”

Dr, Singer is survived by his wife of 60
years, Martha; his daughter, Amparo Heidi;
and two grandchildren.

ERRATUM

The photograph of
Dr. Everett Olson’s
vertebrate paleozool-
ogy class published
on page 3 of the Jan-
uary/February issue
was taken during the
autumn quarter of
1948, not 1946. We
are indebted to

W.T. Stille of Winter
Springs, Florida,
shown second from
right in the photo,
who provided a copy
of his graduate
school transcript to
verify the date.

3 March/April 1994

MAKE NO
BONES
ABOUT IT

Join the Field
Museum Women’s
Board for an exclu-
sive preview of
“DNA to Dinosaurs”
April 21, from 6 p.m.
to 10 p.m. Graze
through a buffet fit
for T. Rex; join a
herd of apatosaurs at
their favorite water-
ing hole; stomp and
romp the evening
away to the music of
Gentlemen of
Leisure; and stake
your claim at the
Dinosaur Raffle (see
p. 9). Business or
field attire; $100 per
person. Call (312)
322-8870 for reser-
vations.

UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS

EDWARD E. AYER SOCIETY
PROMOTES PLANNED GIVING

n the Museum’s Centennial year, Presi-

dent Boyd has announced the creation of

the Edward E. Ayer Society to recognize

those friends of the Field Museum who
have made a commitment to its continued
growth through a planned gift.

Ayers own commitment to creating a nat-
ural history museum began with the arrival of
the Columbian Exposition to Jackson Park in
1893. Ayer and other city leaders began to dis-
cuss the possibility of securing the vast and
magnificent collections — ethnology, natural
history, minerals, gems — for a permanent col-
lection. Ayer knew that this was an opportu-
nity that would not present itself again. He
needed to raise the necessary funds to create a
world-class institution and the obvious choice
to ask for major funding was Marshall Field I.
However, Marshall Field was reported to have
said; “I don’t know anything about a museum
and I don’t care to know anything about a
museum. I’m not giving you a million dollars.”
It was Ayer’s unswerving desire and commit-
ment to create a natural history museum in
Chicago that allowed him to eventually over-
come Marshall Field’s resistance.

Ayer’s commitment to the Museum con-
tinued when he was elected the first president
of the Field-Columbian Museum, beginning a
devotion to the institution that lasted until his
death in 1927. Among his more than 100 gifts
to the Museum were his vast ornithological
library and a spectacular collection of Egyptian
artifacts. “Edward E. Ayer was truly a prime
moyer in the Museum’s history,” President
Boyd said, “an individual with deeply felt
vision and foresight for the Museum’s future
and the future of Chicago. We are proud to
establish the Edward E. Ayer Society to honor
those friends of the Museum whose foresight
and vision in their estate planning ensures a
vital future for the Field Museum in its second
century. ”

Donors of all planned gifts, regardless of
type or amount, are considered for membership

Edward E. Ayer

in the Edward E. Ayer Society. Through a will,
whether new or revised, a donor can specify a
bequest of a dollar amount, personal property
such as collections of value, a percentage of
one’s estate, or what is left after providing for
loved ones. Charitable remainder trusts and
gifts to the Museum’s Pooled Income Fund are
planned gifts that give back; they provide the
donor with income for life and current tax sav-
ings while ensuring a gift to benefit the
Museum’s future. Donors may also make a
lasting gift by naming the Museum a charitable
beneficiary of a retirement plan or life insur-
ance plan which they no longer need for family
protection or supplemental income. Finally,
through a life estate arrangement, a donor can
make a gift of a home or farm now, but retain
the security of living there as long as he or she
wishes, enjoying the tax deductions and the
satisfaction of giving to the Museum now
rather than later. For more information about
membership in the Edward E. Ayer Society,
call (312) 322-8868.

50750

_ Dress Code; Girls — skirt o

Registration is limiced. No telephone fae can be accepted. Ady. n
arranged. For more information please call the Membesiy Depa,

_ Name(s) of child(ren)

The Field Museum is pleased: to che: members a special program to revi es
noted educator and ambassador of good manners, will head the program, which is designed to take the formality out of etiquette by making
social manners educational and a happy experience. Children will learn proper diction, table manners, telephone manners, and ¢ courteous
behavior for visiting a museum.

a

joys — collared shirt. No j jeans

Name of parent or adult

City, State, ZIP _

Mail to: Membership Dept., Field V

- “THe CHILDREN’S SPOON”

diel 14. Paula Petsons

is four-week program are written for ae age group, and Readout are = prvi for parent and child, Gruden

Field will be given to each Here student.

The fee & dey program is $85 per child, ait a 10 percent discount for each sddinbndl child in the same. family. The pineram will be held
on four consecutive Saturdays, March 26, April 2, ee 9, and April 16. Children age 4-5 years will meet from liam. — cies 6-8
years, ] p.m.—2 p.m; and age 9-14 ye 2:30 p.m. —

r elas isa dresed hin

‘at (312) 922-9410, oe

March/April 1994

CALENDAR OF EVENTS
VISIONES DEL PUEBLO:

FOLK ARTS OF LATIN AMERICA

product of many societies, with
aesthetic roots in European,
African, and Amerindian cul-
tures, Latin American folk art is
rich in tradition, diverse in style,
sundry in purpose. Largely unknown outside
the regions where it was created, it is the focus
of an exhibit titled “Visiones del Pueblo: The
Folk Art of Latin America,” on display in the
Museum’s South Gallery from April 15
through June 19.
Organized by the
Museum of American
Folk Art in New York
City with funding by
Ford Motor Company,
“Visiones del Pueblo”
traces the history of
Latin American folk art
from the Spanish con-
quest to the present.
Some 250 objects from
17 countries, displayed
along with maps and
photo montages, show that Latin American folk
art has cosmopolitan origins extending back to
the great civilizations of ancient Mesoamerica
and across the Atlantic to such disparate locales
as the Iberian Peninsula and the Gold Coast of
Africa. Religious themes, practical applica-
tions, and purely decorative intent inspired the
creation of the exhibit objects, an eclectic col-
lection that includes a figurine of the Archangel
Michael, a gaily illustrated lottery ticket, a pair
of intricately carved wooden spurs, a ritual
jaguar mask, an oil-on-tin painting of the Vir-
gin of San Juan de Los Lagos, and a whirligig
representing Lampiao, a Robin Hood-like

Brazilian folk hero.

The exhibit also features a ten-minute
video about Latin American folk art and life. In
addition, a free family guide (with English and
Spanish text) will be offered to parents and
educators as an aid to familiarizing children
with Latin American culture.

In conjunction with “Visiones del Pueblo,”
the Field Museum will present a variety of
music, dance, and theater performances, as well
as story and poetry readings, workshops, lec-
tures, and demon-
strations by Latin
American folk
artists. These activi-
ties will be held on
Saturdays and Sun-
days beginning
April 16, and on
Thursday after-
; noons. (See the Vis-
itor Programs page
for details.)

The exhibit
was organized by Marion Oettinger, Jr., a cul-
tural anthropologist and curator of folk art and
Latin American art at the San Antonio Museum
of Art. Oettinger, who assembled the pieces
while serving as a guest curator at the Museum
of American Folk Art, is also the author of the
128-page color illustrated catalogue. Published
by Dutton Studio Books in association with the
Museum of American Folk Art, the catalogue
includes essays on “The Nature of Folk Art of
Latin America,” “The Makers of Folk Art,”
“The Many Faces of Latin American Folk Art,”
“Continuity and Change,” and an annotated
bibliography.

AFRICA’S LEGACY IN MEXICO:
PHOTOGRAPHS BY TONY GLEATON

n 1986 Tony Gleaton, an African-Ameri-

can fashion photographer based in New

York City, bade farewell to Gotham’s

glamorous models to snap pictures of a
decidedly less stylish group: the descendants of
black slaves, known as “Costenos,” who live in
rural villages on Mexico’s Atlantic and Pacific
coasts. While lacking the haute couture ele-
gance of his previous subjects, the Costenos
proved equally photogenic — a fact made read-
ily apparent in a new exhibit titled “Africa’s
Legacy in Mexico: Photographs by Tony
Gleaton,” on display in the Special Exhibit
Gallery from April 1 through July 17.

The exhibit consists of 52 black-and-white

photographs taken over a five-year period. In
that time Gleaton was in constant motion, trav-
eling back and forth between Costeno commu-
nities in the Mexican states of Guerrero and
Oaxaca on the west coast and Veracruz on the
east coast. In doing so he compiled a visual
record that sheds considerable light on the
everyday lives of a little known, but nonethe-
less important component of Mexico’s ethni-
cally diverse population.

Gleaton completed his work with the
Costenos in 1991. Since then he has frequently
journeyed south of Mexico to document the
African presence in Central and South Amer-
ica, His photographs have been exhibited in
centers of African studies in the United States,
and can be found in the collections of
museums and private and public institu-
tions throughout the United States and
Mexico.

“Africa’s Legacy in Mexico” is com-
plemented by a poster and a booklet with
selected images and essays by specialists
in Afro-Latin studies. Organized by the
Watts Towers Art Center in Los Ange-

On April 14, the
Museum together with
Ford Motor Company
will host a gala exhibit §
preview and reception for ¥
delegates to a National
Endowment for the Arts
(NEA) conference on the
future of the arts, meeting in
Chicago on April 14 and 15. Among
those scheduled to attend is Jane
Alexander, chair of the NEA. The exhibit and
all related materials and programs are made
possible by Ford Motor Company.

Chicago marks the seventh stop in the
nine-city national tour of “Visiones del
Pueblo.” Previous venues have been the
Museum of American Folk Art, the San Anto-
nio Museum of Art, the Mexican Museum in
San Francisco, the Corcoran Gallery in Wash-
ington, D.C., the Natural History Museum of
Los Angeles County, and the Art Museum at
Florida International University. From the Field
Museum, the exhibit will continue on to the
Denver Art Museum (which will display it in
collaboration with the Museo de las Americas),
and then to the Toledo Museum of Art.

— Steven Weingartner

HELD MUSEUM

THE SMART WAY TO HAVE FUN.

les, the exhibit comes to the Field Museum as
part of a national tour that will last through the
summer of 1996, made possible by the Smith-
sonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service
(SITES).

— Steven Weingartner

5 March/April 1994

MARCH/APRIL EVENTS

3/4-6

e e

African Diaspora
e

Symposium
“The African Presence in the Americas”
symposium will explore the diaspora of
African peoples and cultures in the Western
Hemisphere. The symposium features
experts from around the United States, as
well as a series of performances of Afro-
Cuban music and dance by Orlando “Pun-
tilla” Rios and his group Nueva Generacion.
Cost for the entire weekend's program is $18
($15 for members, students, and seniors).
For information, call (312) 322-8854.

3 / 9 Wednesday

What's Brewing?

From Pilsener to Dopplebock, from Weiss to
Framboise, taste the finest of the world’s
brewed beverages of Belgium, France, Great
Britain, Germany, and Chicago, U.S.A. 6:30
— 8 p.m. in the Rice Wildlife Research Sta-
tion. Tasting conducted by Mary Ross. $20
members, $25 guests. Participants must be
21 years or older. For more information, call
(312) 922-9410, ext. 453.

Fe eee

Chicago Shell Club

Kevin and Linda Sunderland, divers and
authorities on Caribbean shells, address the
Chicago Shell Club on the topic of collect-
ing. The club was founded 30 years ago
under the sponsorship of the Field Museum
and meets monthly at the Shedd Aquarium.
Open to the public. 1 p.m. The April ,
10 program is “The Beauty of
Shells” with Charles Owen of
the Institute of Design. Call
(312) 973-5459 for further
information.

3/ The

Nature Camera Club

Two outstanding Chicago-area photogra-
phers, Earl and Betty Kubis, present a special
program on the American West. Next pro-
gram is Monday, April 11, with Tom Holmes
on “Exposure: Solving the Mystery.” All pro-
grams are at 7:30 p.m. in Lecture Hall 2; use
the West Door.

March/April 1994 6

RY a gated

Lecture: Han Jade

Jessica Rawson, Keeper of Oriental Antiqui-
ties at the British Museum, addresses the
Collections Committee on “Chinese Jade
from Major Recent Excavations at Han
Dynasty Sites, 200 B.C. — A.D. 200.” 5:30
p.m., Montgomery Ward Hall, followed by a
reception. For information on Collections
Committee membership, call Julie Sass at
(312) 322-8874.

3/19 & 26

Saturdays

African-American
Community Trips

Tours of two communities will explore the
African presence in this city. The March 19
tour “A Visit to Puerto Rico in Chicago” will
depart for the Ruiz Belvis Cultural Center;
the March 26 tour “A Visit to Senegal in
Chicago” will depart for the DuSable
Museum of African American History. Space
may be available. For more information call
(312) 322-8854.

3/ 26 Saturday

Family Workshop:
Egeciting Eggs!

What do different bird eggs look like and
why are they different? Learn what makes
an egg the perfect package for a fragile new
life. Take an up-close look at the eggs of
assorted birds to see how they are alike and
different. Hunt for eggs in the “Into the
: » Wild” exhibit and dye an egg
Pwith natural colors to take
home. 10 a.m. — noon;
—@. adults and children
®, grades K—2. Cost is
§ $9 ($7 for members)
b ~per person. Call
Ee (312) 322-8854 for
fF further information.

3/19 & 26

Saturdays

Tour of Southwest
Collections

Join the Collections Committee for a tour of
the archaeological and ethnographic collec-
tions from the southwestern United States.
Led by anthropologist Jonathan Haas, the
tour will feature a close look at pottery, bas-
ketry, and textiles. The tour will last from 1-
3 p.m. and is open to Collections Committee
members only. For membership information,
call Julie Sass at (312) 322-8874.

ype | Maeda

Lecture:
Komodo Dragons

Trooper Walsh, reptile keeper at the
National Zoo in Washington, addresses the
Chicago Herpetological Society on the
topic “Dragon Tales: The History, Hus-
bandry, and Breeding of Komodo Dragons
at the National Zoological Park.” Komodo
dragons, the largest lizards in the world (10
feet, 3.5 inches is the record), have been
kept at the National Zoo since 1934, but it
was not until 1992 that one was hatched
outside of their Indonesian homeland.
Open to the public. 7:30 p.m.; enter at the
West Door.

4/ 1 Friday

Exhibit opens: ‘Africa’s
Legacy in Mexico’

Fifty-two black-and-white photographs by
Tony Gleaton are displayed in the Special
Exhibit Gallery. Through July 17.

A/V3 wesmsin

Exhibit opens:
‘Visiones del Pueblo’

Featured are 250 objects of Latin American
folk art from 17 countries. In the South
Gallery through June 19.

3/3- 4/17

Thursdays

‘Out of Africa’
Lecture Series

Join Field Museum researchers for a series
of illustrated lectures on Africa. Topics
include African peoples, wildlife, geogra-
phy and environment. Time is noon on
Thursdays. Admission is free. For details,
see the Visitor Programs page. Call (312)
922-9410, ext. 203 for more information.

4/20 sesnain

The Wines of Spring

Celebrating the Field Museum’s Centennial,
Mother's Day, or the rites of spring? Taste
and discuss red, white, and sparkling wines
that announce spring as surely as the tax
tables. 6:30 — 8 p.m. in the Rice Wildlife
Research Station. Tasting conducted by Mary
Ross. $20 members, $25 guests. Participants
must be 21 years or older. For more informa-
tion, call (312) 922-9410, ext. 453.

SYMPOSIUM: THE AFRICAN
PRESENCE IN THE AMERICAS

e new “Africa” exhibit in the Daniel
F. and Ada L. Rice Wing provides the
thematic underpinnings for a week-
end-long, in-depth look at the African
diaspora March 4-6. A symposium on “The
African Presence in the Americas” will feature
experts from around the United States, and
there will be a series of performances of Afro-
Cuban music and dance by Orlando “Puntilla”
Rios and his group Nueva Generacién.

During the weekend symposium, speakers
will explore the African presence in the her-
itage of North, Central, and South America
through history, music, religion, science, lan-
guage, art, and genealogy. The rich variety of
Afro-Cuban music and dance will be presented
during short performance demonstrations by
Nueva Generacién on Friday and Sunday and a
full-length performance on Saturday.

Our series of speakers combined with per-
formances by Puntilla will take place over three
days — Friday, March 4, 6:45-9:00 p.m.; Satur-
day, March 5, 10:00 a.m.-2:30 p.m.; and Sun-
day, March 6, 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.. While we
encourage you to take part in the entire week-
end’s program, tickets will be sold at the door
only for each day’s events on a space-available
basis. Tickets for the entire weekend’s pro-
grams are $18 ($15 members, students and
seniors).

Two field trips to local communities high-
lighted in the weekend’s presentations will be
offered following the symposium. “A Visit to
Puerto Rico in Chicago” at the Ruiz Belvis
Cultural Center will be featured on March 19
and “A Visit to Senegal in Chicago” at the
DuSable Museum of African American History
on March 26.

These programs are partially funded by the
National Endowment for the Humanities and
the Joyce Foundation. For ticket information
call (312) 322-8854.

SCIENCE IN AFRICA

Thomas Bass, author of Camping with the
Prince and Other Tales of Science in Africa,
will visit the Field Museum to discuss scientific
work currently being done in Africa. Copies of
his book will be available for purchase and
signing after the lecture. Saturday, March 12 at
2 p.m. This lecture is supported by the National
Science Foundation. Admission is $5 ($3 mem-
bers, students and seniors). Call (312) 322-
8854 for information.

Orlando “Puntilla” Rios and Nueva Generacion

@@ee2e0202000000068008080800
SUMMER WORLDS TOUR CAMP 1994

This unique collaboration between Adler Planetarium, Shedd Aquar-
ium, and the Field Museum is entering its third season. One-week
camp sessions will be available for children and young adults grades
K-12. The sessions are planned for the weeks of July 25-29, August 1-
5, August 8-12, and August 15-19, 9:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Registration
will begin March 15 and will take place through the Shedd Aquarium.
Call (312) 322-8854 for a brochure.

May-August ‘Field Guide’

Available in April

New courses are being offered this summer including a course on Latin American women
writers and a family drawing class. Summer field trips include the ever-popular fossil collect-

ing trips and a Chicago Waterways excursion. Highlights of the program guide include a semi-
nar featuring the photographic exhibition “Africa’s Legacy in Mexico” and a lecture and tour
by Dr. Marion Oettinger, curator of the traveling exhibit ““Visiones del Pueblo: The Folk Art of
Latin America.”

For a copy of Field Guide — Programs for Adults and Children call (312) 322-8854.

v4 March/April 1994

Become a Member
of The Field Museum

and receive these benefits:

Free admission

Free coat checking and strollers
Invitation to Members’ Night

Priority invitations to special exhibits
Free subscription to In the Field
13-month wall calendar featuring exhibit
photographs

Reduced subscription prices on selected
magazines
Opportunity to receive the Museum’s
annual report

10% discount at all Museum stores
Use of our 250,000-volume

natural history library

Discount on classes, field trips, and seminars
for adults and children

Members-only tour program
Opportunity to attend the annual
children’s Holiday Tea

Children’s “dinosaur” birthday card
10% discount at Picnic in the Field

Vi¥S YOY (VV OOS VP 2 ViNENEY: VY.

MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION
New Members only. This is not a renewal form.

‘®., Please enroll me as a Member of
The Field Museum

Name.

SON i a ae
City.

State___ Zip

Home phone

Business 01 ee

GIFT APPLICATION FOR
Name

Address

City

State__. Zip

Home phone

Business phone

GIFT FROM
Name
Address

City

State — Zip
Home phone

Business phone

MEMBERSHIP CATEGORIES

cy Individual — one year $35 / two years $65

@) Family — one year $45 / two years $85
(Includes two adults, children and grand-
children 18 and under.)
Student/Senior — one year $25
(Individual only. Copy of I.D. required.)

QC) Field Contributor — $100 - $249

e) Field Adventurer — $250 - $499

C) Field Naturalist — $500 - $999

XY Field Explorer — $1,000 - $1,499

All benefits of a family membership
— and more

we: Founders’ Council — $1,500

Send form to:
The Field Museum, Roosevelt Rd. at Lake Shore
Dr., Chicago, IL 60605

Raices del Ande
April 16

Tuesday, March 1
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, March 2
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, March 3

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

“1 2noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-
ture Series High in the Horn of
Africa by Dr. William Burger

Friday, March 6
10am - 2pm Native American
Tools

Saturday, March 5

10am & 12noon Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

11am Stories Around the World
12noon - 3pm Arthrocart

Sunday, March 6
12 - 3pm Arthrocart

¥ Tuesday, March 8

10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, March 9
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, March 10

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour
12noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-
ture Series Mammals of the Snow-
Capped Mountains of the African
Equator by Dr. Julian Kerbis

Friday, March 11
10am - 2pm Lava

Saturday, March 12
11am Highlight Tour of “Into the
Wild” Exhibit

Tuesday, March 15
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, March 16
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, March 17

12noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-
ture Series Sneaky Breeding by
Female Weaver Birds in Kenya by
Dr. Wendy Jackson

Friday, March 18
10am - 2pm Rock & Mineral Match

Saturday, March 19

9am-5pm Green & Growing...
An Urban Gardening Fair The 3rd
annual fair features a keynote
address by noted horticulturalist Jim
Fizzell, concurrent sessions on a
variety of gardening and open-
space topics, demonstration gar-
dens, quick demos covering gar-
dening "how-tos," & exhibits. The
fee is $7 and includes fair registra-
tion and admission to the Museum.
Call (312) 286-6767 for a brochure.
11am Stories Around the World

Sunday, March 20

9am-5pm Green & Growing...
An Urban Gardening Fair Demon-
stration gardens, quick demos cov-
ering gardening "how-tos," exhibits
& family activities.

Tuesday, March 22
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, March 23
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

March/April 1994 8

Thursday, March 24

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

12noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-
ture Series Africa's Mammal Diver-
sity: From Specimens to Under-
standing by Dr. Bruce Patterson

Tuesday, March 29
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, March 30
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, March 31

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

12noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-
ture Series The Small Mammals of
the Eastern Arc Mountains, Eastern
Africa by Bill Stanley

Friday, April 1
10am - 2pm Terrific Teeth

Saturday, April 2
11am Stories Around the World

Tuesday, April 5
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, April 6
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, April 7

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour
12noon Out of Africa: Exploring
the Natural History of Africa Lec-

ture Series Mountains of the Moon:

Ornithological Expedition to
Uganda by Dr. Dave Willard &
Tom Gnoske

Friday, April 11
10am - 2pm Horns & Antlers

Tuesday, April 12
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, April 13
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, April 14
11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

Saturday, April 16

11am Stories Around the World
Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Wood Block Prints
with Carlos Cortez & Ojo de Dios
with Tina Fung Holder

Latin Folk Art Performances:*
1pm Raices Del Andes performs
music of Bolivia & the Andes.
3pm Diego Juarez Sanchez per-
forms traditional music from the
Americas.

Sunday, April 17

Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Peruvian wood carv-
ing by Francisco Aznaran; Mexican
Puppets with Maria Villarreal; and
Guatemalan Weaving by Maria
Poc.

Latin Folk Art Performances:*
1pm Oxib-Kajau Marimba Ensem-
ble performs music of Guatemala.
3pm Keith Eric performs music &
stories of Jamaica.

Tuesday, April 19
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, April 20
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

VISITOR PROGRAMS

William Burger

Thursday, April 21

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Molas with Tina Fung
Holder, clay sculptures by Roman
Villarreal, & Papel Picado with Teri
Duncan.

Latin Folk Art Performance:*
12noon Venicio de Toledo per-
forms Afro-Brazilian rhythms.

Friday, April 22
10am - 2pm Pareus

Saturday, April 23

Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Mexican Tin Painting
Activity with Maria Uribe and Mex-
ican Weaving with Consuelo
Becerra

Latin Folk Art Performances:*
1pm Alejandro Scarpino performs
Argentine Bandoneon & Folklore.
3pm Mi Lindo Panama Children's
Folkloric group performs.

Sunday, April 24

Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Peruvian Tops with
Cesar Izquierdo and Mural Painting
activity with Robert Valadez.

Latin Folk Art Performances:*

1pm Cantores Guaranies perform
music of Paraguay.

3pm Viva Panama Panamanian
Folkloric performance.

Tuesday, April 26
10am - 1pm Owl Pellets

Wednesday, April 27
10am - 1pm Arthrocart

Thursday, April 28

11am & 1 pm Celebrating Our
Centennial Highlight Tour

Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Masks activity with
Maria Uribe and Mexican paper
flowers with Maria Enriquez de
Allen.

Latin Folk Art Performance:*
11:30am Kanoon Magnet School
performs a "Tribute to the Fifth Sun"
12:30pm Carmen Aguilar performs
stories of Latin America.

Friday, April 29
10am - 2pm African Puzzle Map

Saturday, April 30

11am Stories Around the World
Latin Folk Art Demonstrations:*
11am - 3pm Papel Picado activity
with Teri Duncan & Roman Villar-
real demonstrates clay sculpture.
Latin Folk Art Performances:*
1pm Juan Dies & Victor Pichardo
performs “El Son y el Corrido: Sto-
rytelling and song in two Mexican
Ballad Traditions.” A special thanks
to the Old Town School of Folk

Music.
3pm Renacer Boliviano performs
dances of Bolivia.

Daniel F. & Ada L. Rice Wildlife
Research Station

Videotapes, computer programs,
educator resources, books and
activity boxes about the animal
kingdom are available.

Daily 9am-5pm

Webber Resource Center

Native Cultures of the Americas
Books, videotapes, educator
resources, tribal newspapers and
activity boxes about native peoples
of the Americas are available.
Daily 10am—4:30pm

Harris Educational Loan Center
Chicago area educators may bor-
row activity boxes and small diora-
mas from Harris Center. For more
information call: (312) 322-8853.
Open House Hours:

Tuesdays 2:30-7pm

Thursdays 2:30—5pm

Saturdays 9am—5pm

Place For Wonder

A special room of touchable
objects where you can discover
daily life in Mexico, in addition to
an array of fossils, shells, rocks,
plants and live insects.
Weekdays: 12:30-4:30pm
Weekends: 10am—4:30pm

Pawnee Earth Lodge

Walk into a traditional home of the
Pawnee Indians of the Great Plains
and learn about their daily life dur-
ing the mid-19th century. Week-
days: 1:00 pm programs

Saturdays: 10am—4:30pm; Free
ticketed programs at 11, 12, 2 & 3.
Sundays: 10am—4:30pm

Ruatepupuke:

A Maori Meeting House
Discover the world of current
Maori people of New Zealand at
the treasured and sacred Maori
Meeting House.

Open daily 9am-5pm

Africa Today: Resource Center
Books, periodicals, videotapes,
educator resources and activity
boxes to complement the new

Africa exhibit.

Open daily 10am-4:30pm

Volunteers for the Daniel F. & Ada
L. Rice Wildlife Research Station
are needed. Weekday & weekend
facilitators to answer questions and
help visitors use materials in the
resource center are desired. A two
week training program will be
offered in early April. Please con-
tact the Museum Volunteer Coordi-
nator at (312) 922-9410, ext. 360
for further detail.

*All Latin American Folk
Art programs are
sponsored by Ford Motor
Company.

High in the Horn of Africa, March 3

UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS

‘OWN A BONE’ BRINGS IN $135,000 FROM
8,600 SPONSORS TO SUPPORT BRACHIOSAURUS

wn A Bone, the fund-raising

campaign for the Field

Museum’s Brachiosaurus exhi-

bit, ended on December 31 after

a nine-month run. The figures
are all in, and they show that the campaign was
a success of truly dinosaurian proportions.

According to the Development Depart-
ment’s Melinda Pruett-Jones, Own A Bone
generated $135,000 in the form of 3,528 cash
gifts from more than 8,600 sponsors. (Many
individuals pooled their money to make collec-
tive contributions, which were counted singly
— hence there are more sponsors than gifts.)

A breakdown of these totals shows that
162 gifts were made by Museum members,
volunteers, and staff, while 3,528 came from
individuals and groups from throughout the
United States and Canada. Many of the collec-
tive gifts were made by children, who con-
tributed as members of Scout units, clubs, and
school groups. Corporate donors also got into
the act, providing 30 gifts totaling $3,427, and
matching gifts totaling $1,485.

As an added bonus, the Museum gained 89
new individual and family memberships from
the ranks of Brachiosaurus sponsors.

A tally of Own A Bone contributions
reveals that the Brachiosaurus skull was spon-
sored ten times, the humerus twice, the jaw-

~ AvoID EXTINCTION —
A Motorola AC2250 transportable carry phone and 500
free airtime minutes courtesy of, Ameritech Cellular
BONES, BONES, BONES _
Dinners for four courtesy of Boston Chicken, Lettuce
Entertain You Enterprises Inc., The Levy Organization,
_Hecky’s, J P's The Eating Place, Robinson's, and Father
and Son Pizza complemented by a six-month member-
ship in the Better Beer Club courtesy of Schaeffer's -

Please indicate the se number of chances
oi oat i

| Check ees ie

Name _

oe _

Gi, Stat, Te

Telephone __)_ _

78850

bone 40 times, the pelvis once, and the rib
bones more than 300 times. “Purchases” of

hand, foot, and toe bones numbered in the hun-
dreds, and of teeth and tail vertebrae, in the
thousands.

The names of the sponsors will be listed on
a first-draft donor plaque to be installed at the
base of the Brachiosaurus mount in March.
Sponsors are encouraged to check the plaque

John Weinstein / GN87103

Martina Hough and the Beast

Le toys courtesy of K & M International, Inc., and
anaes books courtesy of Agion Products -

RECAPTURE THE PAST

Hand-cratted: amber and sterling silver necklace created :

by a Polish artisan containing an exquisite natural Baltic
cognac color amber cabochon stone estimated to be 45
_ million ae old, courtesy of Elzbieta es

“UNIQUE FossILS
Fossils custom-designed into gold earrings with diamond

accents aw of Maney, Henan ine.

1525100

_made payee : The Fil Museum

Sendy your entry to Dinosaur Raffle The Field cinluscirt 8 Roose Road at Lak Shore Drive Oh i I

aa Mailed entries must be received by April 15, 1994.

OFFICIAL RULES —

me nners wi siereeymrmene itt at 1994, Was sede

GN87057.12

Diane Alexander White / GN87108.28

and let the Museum know about any errors they
may find or changes they would like to make to
their respective listings. Correction forms will
be available for this purpose at the Visitor Ser-
vices Booth.

A permanent donor plaque will be installed
in May. Later that month sponsors will be
invited to a preview of the Museum’s new
exhibit “DNA To Dinosaurs” to celebrate their
participation in the Brachiosaurus project.

In recognizing the success of Own A
Bone, Vice President Willard E. White
acknowledged the efforts of staff members
Melinda Pruett-Jones, Marilyn Cahill, Peter
Laraba, Steve Weingartner, Jessica Clark,
Suzanne Borland, and Rodger Patience, as well
as volunteer George Wolnak. “A special word
of thanks, though, to Martina Hough,” said
White. “She answered innumerable phone calls
from people interested in contributing to the
Brachiosaurus project. In doing so she was fre-
quently required to explain the campaign in
exhaustive (and exhausting!) detail to would-be
sponsors, a task she performed with unfailing
courtesy, patience, and good humor.”

Alonzo Spellman, Chicago Bears defensive end, with fifth-graders from the
McArthur School in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, visited the “Africa” exhibit
December 7. The kids are participants in Spellman’s “Americans All” pro-
gram, designed to expand cultural awareness.

Banker and broadcaster Norman Ross (front row, center) was honored at a
ceremony and reception in the Field Museum February 13 for 25 years of
work in promoting U.S.-China trade and cultural understanding. Paying
tribute were (seated, from left) Chicago Alderman Burton Natarus; Li
Zhaoxing, Chinese ambassador to the United Nations; Wang Li, the Chi-
nese consul in Chicago; Burt Moy, special assistant to Mayor Daley; and
(standing, from left) W. Dennis Hodges and James H. Hartung of the
Northwest Indiana World Trade Council; David J. Vitale of First Chicago
Corp.; Linda Yu of WLS-TV; Thomas M. McDermott of the Northwest Indi-
ana Forum; and Arthur Cyr of the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations.

9 March/April 1994

David Nitecki,
above, sits atop the
stromatolite forma-
tion in Saratoga
Springs, N.Y., which
Charles Walcott
demonstrated was of
organic origin. A
much younger
(Recent) stromatolite
bed, in Shark’s Bay,
Australia, is at right,
center.

Below, artist Leonid
Tolpygin’s concep-
tion of life in a Pre-
cambrian sea, part of
an exhibit in the
Museum of Paleon-
tology of the Russian
Academy of Sci-
ences, Moscow.

At right above, the
geologist Charles
Lyell, a champion of
“gradualism.”

CAMBRIAN ...

(Continued from page 1)
with living creatures.”

Within a few years, the Silurian explosion
had been abandoned in favor of a Cambrian
explosion as fossil evidence from the more dis-
tant past — some 570
million years ago —
came to light, about
the tme Darwin pub-
lished the sixth edition
of the Origin in 1872.
This freefall of the
“fossil explosion” was
roughly 130 million
years, twice as long as
the entire Cenozoic
age of mammals.

In 1914, Charles
Walcott, secretary of
the Smithsonian Insti-
tution, demonstrated
that stromatolites,
long thought to be
inorganic objects, are
in fact fossils of bac-
teria and blue-green
algae, found all over
the world in rocks
now known to be Pre-
cambrian, about 3.5
billion years old. In the 1950s, primitive plants
were found in rocks about 2 billion years old.
This was almost immediately followed by dis-
covery of Precambrian animals. The oldest
eukaryotes (all organisms more advanced than
bacteria and blue-green algae) may be more
than 2.1 billion years old, but the best-pre-
served and -documented are from China,
approximately 1.4 billion years old. These dis-
coveries made the “Cambrian explosion” less
dramatic and, for a short time, a paleontological
nonevent of limited interest. Darwin’s dream
seemed to have been realized: While
geochronology pushed back the age of the earth
to 4.5 billion years, the advent of Precambrian
paleobiology filled most of this inconceivable
vastness of time with a continuous and unbro-
ken record of life.

But soon there would be heralded a new
Cambrian explosion, and a renewed debate
between evolutionary “catastrophists” and
“sradualists.” Today, the catastrophists have once
again captured the flag. And tomorrow? . . .

eological history is read from ancient
rocks immersed in the sea of time.
Rocks yield but a few of their mysteries
— and generally only one at a time. Occasion-
ally openings are found that allow a closer
examination of past life, and it is these rare

“windows to the past” that both teach
and distort the history, We tend to
accept the windows as the real
images of life, and since we see
nothing earlier or later, we
sometimes claim to see more
than the record permits.

In 1909, Walcott, on his
honeymoon, found in the B
mountains of British §
Columbia a block of shale
—now known to be from }
the Burgess Shale — con-
taining beautifully preserved
fossils. In the following years,
the Smithsonian, and later the
Royal Ontario Museum and Cam-
bridge University, sent expeditions
that collected more than 200,000 speci-
mens. This fauna is most unusual in the
exquisite preservation of soft-bodied animals
unknown from any other location, although dif-
ferent but equally strange Cambrian organisms
have now been found in other parts of North
America, Greenland, China, and Australia.

In numerous papers, Walcott described
many trilobites and other fossils but assigned
them all to living phyla. (A phylum is the
largest classificatory unit below a kingdom;
animal kingdom phyla are such groups as verte-
brates, mollusks, sponges, and arthropods.)
Pigeonholing fossils in their proper taxonomic
nests, however, may be a less objective enter-
prise than many paleontologists want to
believe. Today, many of these animals are
interpreted as strange creatures of completely
unknown affinities. Because of the unusual
preservation of the Burgess Shale, many
unskeletonized phyla are recognized, of which
roughly 18 percent are now interpreted as
extinct phyla. Certainly this number is only a
small fraction of the then-existing life.

To 19th-century paleontologists, phyla
were indestructible. But Field Museum cura-
tors, writing over the years about the much
younger (Carboniferous, ca. 300 million years
old) Mazon Creek fossils, began to question the
permanency of phyla.
A number of Mazon
Creek fossils were
found to represent
extinct, unnamed phyla,
entirely unknown from
earlier or later rocks.
These bizarre, unskele-
tonized creatures are as
rare as those of the
Middle Cambrian
Burgess Shale, and
while no one has yet
suggested a “Carboniferous explosion” for the
Mazon Creek fauna, the ratio of soft-bodied to
skeletonized fossils is much greater than any-
thing found in the Burgess Shale. Unusual
problematic animals, such as the well-known
Tully monster, are in great abundance.

By the end of the 1980s, a “new” Cam-
brian explosion had emerged, not at the bound-
ary of two geological periods but seemingly
spread over a part of the Cambrian, and firmly
anchored in the bedrock of the Burgess Shale.
The new interpretation posits a very rapid
appearance of almost all phyla of invertebrate
animals with (and some without) hard skele-
tons, throughout a large portion of the Cam-
brian. At first the interpretation was based
almost exclusively on the Burgess Shale fossils,
the occurrence of which was viewed as a
chance preservation of soft-bodied animals. But
such animals are now being found in rocks
older (and younger) than the Burgess Shale,
including the Ediacara faunas of Australia and
Russia, which date to perhaps 50 million years
before the Cambrian.

Thus, to some, the new Cambrian explo-
sion means simply the earliest appearance of
animals with hard skeletons, and so is largely
synonymous with the old Cambrian explosion;
to others, it means the appearance of a great

diversity of animal forms over a longer
period of the Cambrian.

Sixty years ago, when the
conventional scientific wisdom
was more strictly Darwinian,
paleontologists tried to
explain away the Cambrian
explosion by postulating a
wide range of causes —
physical, biological, chem-
ical, and even methodolog-
ical and philosophical.
Now, with increasing inter-
est in the new Cambrian
explosion, the same kinds of
causes are invoked to explain
it. Any of the arguments on
either side may be more or less eas-
ily knocked down. The point is that of
all the thousands of fossil localities in the
world, only a handful are known with pro-
nounced fossil breaks, or explosions. There-
fore, theorizing from an unusual site rather than
accepting the incompleteness of the record may
not necessarily be most parsimonious.

Certainly evolutionary rates are not uni-
form for all organisms. For example, some fos-
sil groups remain unchanged for millions of
years, while others evolve rapidly. The issue in
the catastrophist-gradualist debate is not
whether all organisms evolved at the same rate,
but whether all organisms at once evolved at
increased or decreased rates or became extinct
at once. No one disputes that a single group
may radiate rapidly — witness Darwin’s
finches; what is disputed is a sudden radiation
of all or most of life. No special evolutionary
mechanism is required to explain any particular
group of organisms that evolves slowly or
rapidly. The Darwinian rule of gradual, but not
necessarily slow, change seems sufficient for that.

magine future explorers studying life on
earth in the 20th century by relying on fos-
sils from isolated muddy, stagnant, marine
basins; or, conversely, from very diverse coral
reefs. Surely, their interpretation of our present
life would be inaccu-
rate. This is the situa-
tion with the Burgess
Shale. It is enough to
point out that the
anatomical complex-
ity of the Burgess
Shale fauna could not
have been attained
without a comparable
complexity of plant
life, yet the record of
the Burgess Shale
plants is extremely meager, and for all practical
purposes so impoverished that it is seldom con-
sidered. Similarly, we do not fully understand
the physical composition of the sea at the time,
how the fauna came to be deposited, the eyolu-
tionary events that preceded the deposition, or
the post-deposition destructive processes.

The “sudden” explosion of Burgess Shale
animals is exactly repeated in the Mazon Creek
locality. We are therefore free to conclude
either that two explosions occurred or that both
fossil sites are unusual occurrences that distort
the historical mirrors. Our conclusions are

-models, that is, speculations about what may or
may not have been.

The fossil record is often said to be poor,
but the term is relative. It can as easily be said
that the fossil record is good; otherwise there
would be no paleontology. What we can say
with certainty is that our knowledge of the past
is incomplete. It is not our nature to admit igno-
rance humbly, but gn the contrary to speak with
authority, and to claim to discover regularities
in history; when we cannot identify the histori-
cal “laws” we pronounce with equal ex cathe-
dra authority that history 1s controlled by
chance, contingency, or luck.

The unmatched brutality and irrationality
of life in the 20th century has had its inevitable

DINOSAURS ...

(Continued from page 1)

had lots of contact with the local people. We
needed their knowledge of the territory, of
nomad languages, and needed help with trans-
port, water, certain food items. We took some
nomads on side trips and discovered several
sites within four days. With the time remaining,
we set up at a couple of these sites and worked
on those. And we took geological sections and
satellite locations.

“This was an area where African geolo-
gists and other scientists work, and we inter-
acted with them. I think it’s important to dispel
the notion that all the research that’s being
done there is done by Europeans and Ameri-
cans. We worked in the field with a geologist
from Niger.”

Sereno’s party of 24 included two under-
graduates, several graduate students, and pro-
fessionals. The average age of the team in the
field was 27.

“Tt was like living through ‘Indiana Jones
Part 4,°° Sereno volunteered, “the most chal-
lenging, exciting thing we’ve ever managed to
accomplish — hauling six tons of dinosaur
bones over 400 miles of open desert, all the
negotiating, the cultural interaction. It was a
very interactive, very young team. Some said I
was brash for taking these people, but you need
the right mix of expertise and spirit, maybe in
the reverse order.

“We had really a great experience in
Africa. We drove out of the oasis in tears. It
was a very intense experience, living among
people who have very little but are willing at
the drop of a hat to give you half of what they
own. There was not one untoward incident, no
theft, nothing. We contributed school supplies
to the oasis school for the youngest children.
All these little kids run out to the road as we’re
loading our trucks, they know you’re leaving,
and it was very touching. It’s been such a part
of your life for a month, and then you just pick
up and go.”

ust pick up and go” may describe the emo-

tional character of the event, but the actual

process was considerably more drawn out.
Sereno referred to “the challenge of loading six
tons of dinosaur into the back of a truck all in
one day, one piece alone weighed I’d guess
1,200 pounds, and we had to improvise a hoist
for it. And then driving it across 400 miles of
open desert, and ferrying it across the Mediter-
ranean and trucking it to Paris and flying it to
Chicago.”

The destination had to be Paris, rather
than, say, Lagos or Abidjan, “because that was
the closest American Airlines city. They flew
the stuff for free. They flew the crew both
ways, and the supplies and equipment,” Sereno
said. “People see you’re trying to do something
very difficult and are determined to help you do
it: “Let’s see, how can we work this out? .. .’
The bones went as six tons of ‘excess baggage’
on a ferry across the Mediterranean.”

At one point the expedition was nearly
aborted because of bureaucratic delays, illness,
and other logistical problems. “You have to put
this in perspective,” Sereno said. “An expedi-

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Gabrielle Lyon

tion like this one has the potential for encoun-
tering situations that make it impossible to pro-
ceed. We went to greater lengths than in any
previous expedition to sort permissions out in
advance. Yet we experienced a couple-week
delay. Anyone who feels that’s unusual ought
to try to get a permit from the U.S. government
to work on federal land here. You could wait a
month. Niger had elected its first democratic
government just six months before. There are
nine political parties. That we accomplished all
we did with a new government like that is a
credit to the country.

“And we actually had about 75 percent of
the time in the field that we had planned.”

John Weinstein / GN86892.124

Above, Paul Sereno
displays a photograph
from his 1990 visit to
the site, which he
used to secure back-
ing for the expedition.

At right, Sereno ts
pictured with Jeffrey
Wilson (left), a gradu-
ate student at the
University of Chicago,
preparing to move a
field jacket that con-
fains part of the pelvis
of the new sauropod
dinosaur.

Left, Field Museum
staff members arrange
the jacketed fossils in
a storage area.

CAMBRIAN ...

impact on the arts and sciences. By compari-
son, the 19th century appears to have been
rational and peaceful, and 19th-century science
was correspondingly different from ours. Wal-
cott, with his Victorian sensibility, saw the
Burgess Shale creatures as familiar and well-
understood animals, easy to describe and inter-
pret, but mostly unexciting. Now the same fos-
sils are rediscovered, are viewed differently,
acquire a new and strange meaning, new inter-
est; they become richer in what they say.
Stephen Jay Gould, whose 1989 book Wonder-
ful Life popularized the new Cambrian explo-
sion, writes eloquently and smoothly on topics
others treat only haltingly. In the spirit of post-
modern paleontology, he asks new questions,
and offers us a wealth of new anatomical inter-
pretation and a new view of life.
Paleontologists live in the unreal world of
the past much as psychologists live in the

unreal world of dreams, and both fuse their
unrealities with reality. Walcott was not a
romantic interpreter; he does not appear to
have had any scientific ax to grind or any sci-
entific ideology. As a result, his picture of the
past was less colorful than that of postmodern
paleontology. The new paleontology has a
largeness of vision — from the origin of life to
the coming of comets — in which Walcott’s
familiar arthropods assume grotesque and
deformed shapes. Dinosaurs are recreated from
fragments of their own and frogs’ DNA! Inver-
tebrates, in the pages of National Geographic,
have metamorphosed into monsters.

The postmodern interpretation of the
Burgess Shale is imaginative and in keeping
with the current trend of seeing life as pulsating
and evolving. Deconstructing the record of the
Burgess Shale, it shows the strangeness of the
past. Above all, it is a reaction to tradition; it

does not enlarge and build on past accomplish-
ments but destroys the past, seemingly freeing
paleontology from the restraints of the grown-
old gradualism.

Life in this interpretation is full of conflict
between extinction and origination. It has
drama. Any variation can introduce a new fam-
ily, order, class, or phylum. Just as Darwin
freed paleontologists from the necessity of per-
manence, the postmoderns free us from the old-
fashioned, repetitious listing of taxa. They
make fossils alive, and not an illusion of unre-
ality. They put us in touch with the “real” life
of the Cambrian. The old paleontology fades
away.

And mafana?...

11

March/April 1994

Top left, William
Simpson (left) and
Paul Sereno (right)
work over bones of a
new sauropod
dinosaur with local
security officials from
Niger observing.

Gabrielle Lyon

FIELD

WM

371 5545

MUSEUM

31 ee

November 5-22, 1994
The Field Museum Adventure

Fly Air France to

Paris and Nairobi,

then on to the Mara

Safari Club where you'll

spend three nights in a private

tent of Taj Mahal opulence, with a

privileged view of the Mara River and its

wildlife. Land Rovers with expert drivers take you on safari

through the Masai Mara, the northern extension of the

Serengeti Plain. A multitude of savannah animals can be

found on these open grasslands. Optional activities include a
hot air balloon flight and a visit to a Masai village.

After a day at leisure back in Nairobi, it's on to Antananarivo,
Madagascar's capital, where the weekly market day is a white
blaze of tented canopies over the street stalls. Drive on to the
Reserve at Perinet for a view of many indigenous rain forest
birds including blue couas, paradise flycatchers, and magpie
robins. If you’re lucky, you'll spot a rare Indri lemur. In the
Butterfly Reserve you'll see many beautiful specimens —
perhaps including the Mandrake butterfly — found nowhere

else in the world. A flight to Fort Dauphin and a drive to the
Berenty Reserve permits a nocturnal visit for sightings of
lemurs and fruit bats (flying foxes). Next day, your attention
will be diverted from the ubiquitous ring-tailed lemurs to
fabulous birds like the sickle-billed vanga and the giant coua.

Another flight takes us to Nosy Be and the nearby islands,
including the marine reserve at Nosy Tanikely . . . as close to
paradise as it gets. Snorkel the crystal-clear water to see
fabulous coral, starfish, anemones, and tropical fishes. At
Lokobe Natural Reserve, paddle an elegant outrigger along
the coast to spot the elusive lepilemur and the shy black
lemur.

Your guide is Field Museum / University of Chicago zoologist
Thomas Schulenberg, who has done extensive field work on
four visits to Madagascar and on numerous expeditions to
other tropical regions.

Price including roundtrip airfare from Chicago is $6,285 per
person, double occupancy.

@eeeeeooeoeoeede00
Cruising through Provence aboard the m.s. Cézanne
October 11-23, 1994

We will begin our exploration in the Camargue, a vast and
pristine wetland within the Rhone delta and a haven for a
variety of wildlife. Then, for the first time, we will be able to
cruise through this romantic and fascinating region aboard
the new, sophisticated m.s. Cézanne. This cruise provides us
with an elegant and comfortable way to discover the
attractions of the lower Rhone River, a spectular region of
natural beauty made famous by Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cézanne,
and others, who lovingly painted the brilliant countryside
where fields of aromatic lavender perfume the air and ochre-
washed farmhouses punctuate the verdant rolling hills.
Charming medieval towns are scattered across the region,

perched high on rocky spurs, surrounding their chateau or
cathedral. We will also explore many of the important sites
from Provence’s rich Roman history. Our tour will be
accompanied by an outstanding naturalist from the Field
Museum, and the cultural value of this deluxe program will be
greatly enhanced by the leadership of resident lecturers, who
will share with us their knowledge and enthusiasm for this
enchanting region.

Price including roundtrip economy-class airfare from Chicago
is $5,645 per person, double occupancy in twin-bedded cabin.
Air travel and cruise accommodation options are available.

Arctic Watch: Face to Face with 1,000 Belugas

July 9-16, 1994 © via Edmonton to Resolute Bay on Cornwallis Island