EARLIEST NEW WORLD POTTERY OCTOPUS GARDENING A SEPARATE VISION: MODERN NATIVE AMERICAN ART WILDLIFE MAYAN Re ae SA , te cas The Bulletin of the Field Museum of Natural History January/February 1992 4 The Museum goes _ “Into the Wild” with the help of Garfield, Ronald McDonald, and other notables. 3 New exhibits: Issues in Native American contemporary art; wildlife of the ancient Maya lands A complete sched- ule of music, dance, storytelling, and other free programs for Museum visitors River on a Museum tour reveals plants and animals of many ecosystems. Rafting the Colorado BUSHMAN’S BABY PICTURES Bushman, in death as in life, captivates all who see him; the famous gorilla is as much a part of Chicago history as Jane Addams or Al Capone. The Museum has received new- found photographs of his days as an orphan in Cameroon. Story, Page 3 OLDEST WESTERN HEMISPHERE Guiana Highlands ( ~ »” Negro So RS \ | \ Aa pou Ive VN An / Mato Grosso Plateau Aa << y WN Brazilian Highlands, OCTOPUS GARDENING By Janet Voight Assistant Curator of Zoology ctopuses are voracious predators of fishes, crabs, and shrimps, to name just a few of the animals they subdue and consume. Prey are poi- soned and enshrouded in the web that stretches between the octopus’s eight arms, to be carried to the octopus’s den and devoured. Despite the grisly aspects of this behavior, it is remarkably efficient. It’s easy to understand why people associ- ate the octopus with menace and evil. Any ani- mal that can turn from black to white in a fraction of a second, and that when irritated spews out clouds of ink and disappears into an impossibly small crevice, is a ready candidate for demonization. Popular culture, from Jules Verne to Peter Benchley, has solidified these associations; it was no accident that in The Lit- tle Mermaid the villainess was the octopus. But in the real world, people eat more octopuses than vice-versa. In an effort to replace the mysteries of octopus biology with scientifically sound data, I study octopus field biology and the evolution of the group, which numbers more than 100 species. Octopus behavior is unusual and counter-intuitive in many ways. Given their famous ability to learn and adapt to new situa- tions, you’d think they would survive for years in the wild, learning better with each passing day how to improve their chances of survival. However, octopus lives are short. Hatchling octopuses reared in the laborato- ry grow for months at phenomenal rates. Then they stop eating and die. Wild-caught octopus- es maintained in captivity, even in ideal condi- tions, soon wither away. Octopuses appear to have timed senescence: At adulthood, release of a hormone signals the beginning of the end of the octopus’s life. At this time, females pro- duce a single clutch of eggs which they brood. Females refuse food during brooding and die at about the time the eggs hatch. Male life spans equal those of females. This knowledge of octopus life history is based almost exclusively on laboratory studies. As would be the case with any nocturnal, intel- ligent animal that has the ability to change color at will, octopuses are notoriously difficult to study in nature. Instead of main- taining permanent territories or home ranges, they are nomads. They move into new areas fre- quently, staying in one location for a week or two at most. Biologists who have marked individual octopuses find that at least half of the marked animals are never seen again. Whether the octopuses abandon the area or learn to avoid divers and traps is unknown, but the end result is the same. When so few marked ani- mals are recaptured, it suggests that handling so stresses the ani- mals that any data obtained are suspect and cannot be used. Even identifying individuals by marks such as missing arms is unreliable because octopuses regenerate missing parts, often very quickly. (Continued on page 10) Diane Alexander White / GN86107.10 POTTERY IS FOUND IN AMAZON he earliest pottery ever found in the Western Hemisphere has been unearthed in the Amazon basin by a team headed by Anna Roosevelt, newly appointed curator of archaeology at the Field Museum. The pottery is a significant piece of evidence supporting a controversial argument: that complex human societies can play a productive and sustaining role in the balance of nature over thousands of years. The discovery of the ancient vessels is reported in the December 13 issue of Science. The fragile, red-brown pottery fragments have been reliably dated, by radiocarbon and ther- moluminescence analysis, at 7,000 to 8,000 years before the present. That makes them at least 1,000 years older than the oldest pottery found in northern South America, and 3,000 years older than the earliest pottery from the Andes and Mesoamerica (Mexico, Guatemala, and Belize). For many years, the tropical forest habitat of Amazonia had been considered too resource-poor to nourish long-term cultural evolution. But Roosevelt leads a new genera- tion of researchers who, with persistence and sophisticated analytical techniques, have over- turned that view. Her latest discovery indicates that, far from being held back by their environ- ment, the people of the Amazon were leaders and innovators, achieving technological and aesthetic advances long before the cultures of the Andes, such as the Inca civilization. The discovery of the pottery came as part of a larger project to uncover the history of human occupation in Santarém, Brazil, a tropi- cal region in the flood plain of the Amazon. “This region has a very long history of habitation, with many changes in population (Continued on page 11) OFF WE GO: Vine cutting opens “Into the Wild.” Officiat- ing were, from left, Ronald McDonald; Cirillo McSween, representing the Ronald McDonald Children’s Charities; Michael Spock (rear), Field Museum vice president for public programs; Ed Reilly, grant coordi- nator of the Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Foundation; and Willard E, White, Museum vice presi- dent for develop- ment and external affairs. (See page 4.) THE RIGHT TO CARE, THE DUTY TO CARE By Willard L. Boyd President, Field Museum of Natural History he year just ended was the bicentennial year of the Bill of Rights. The year just beginning marks the quincentennial of the arrival of Columbus in the New World. The juxtaposition of these anniversaries prompts reflection on the diversity of the American people, on our rights, and on the responsibilities we have toward one another. In his book Puritan Boston and Quaker Philadelphia, E. Digby Baltzell describes the unique American practice of private philan- thropy as the “rational response to social condi- tions,” with the emphasis on rational in contrast to the spontaneity and emotion of “charity.” He considers philanthropy as the devotion to car- ing without sentimentality. That sounds puri- tanical, sounds like a call to duty in an era when we are calling for rights, not duties. Per- haps that is why the Christian Science Monitor recently ran an editorial entitled “The Right to Care.” Whether a right or a duty, “caring” is a basic human characteristic, both psychological- ly and sociologically. Psychologically, we need the nourishment of others, Others give meaning to our lives. Sociologically, almost every religious and social norm, written or unwritten, admonishes us to care for one another. “Caring” is more than a warm and fuzzy feeling that we can turn on and off when it suits our individual mood. “Caring” is a full- time commitment which demands much of us. It is truly a devotion to others. I was moved by the television account of the people of a French town who together took the initiative to protect strangers during the Second World War, each citizen taking part in the protection of Jewish refugees from the Holocaust. The citizens did so because their Huguenot faith holds there is a “duty to act.” Ethics is the means by which we personal- ly stipulate our conduct as individuals and as citizens. A code of ethics inhibits our freedom to act solely for our own pleasure and demands of us a sense of responsibility, a sense of caring for others. Who are these others we are supposed to care for? We care for our friends because we know them. Our friends tend to be like us. They have similar, hence familiar, backgrounds. It is harder for us to care for strangers, yet we — like the Huguenots — have a duty to help Strangers, those with whom we are unfamiliar, those whom we cannot even imagine. Unfamiliarity is a form of ignorance, and ignorance breeds prejudice. Prejudice breeds hostility and hostility breeds conflict. It is imperative that we care for people who are unfamiliar to us, people whom we consider dif- ferent. We need to connect with others. To con- nect with others we must understand and respect the cultural traditions of all people, however diverse. Caring eliminates ignorance, eliminates prejudice, eliminates hostility, elimi- nates conflict. During the bicentennial year of our Bill of Rights, we focused on expanding our civil rights. We should also concentrate on expand- ing our civil duties. Civil attitudes are the glue of a democratic society. Each of us must be affirmative about oth- ers, be interested in others, and be committed to others — especially to strangers. As an institu- tion concerned with diverse cultures of the world, the Field Museum has a special respon- sibility to be a community center for cultural understanding and mutual respect. he Friends of Field Museum Library met Library Friends Valerie Metzler and William Minter, with son Ezra, examine rare works of botani- cal illustration. John Weinstein / GN86063,19 January/February 1992 Vol. 63, No.1 Editor: Ron Dorfman Art Director: Shi Yung Editorial Assistant: Steve Crescenzo In the Field (ISSN #1051-4546) is published bimonthly by Field Museum of Natural History, Roosevelt Road at Lake Shore Drive, Chicago !L 60605-2496. Copyright © 1992 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 welcome. Museum phone (312) 922-9410. Notification of address change should include address label and should be sent to Member- ship Department. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to In the Field, Field Museum of Natural History. Second class postage paid at Chicago, Illinois. October 24 to view the temporary exhibit “Flora Portrayed” and hear a short dis- cussion on botanical illustration and literature. The Museum’s newest special-interest support group, the Collections Committee, held its first meeting December 11 for an introduction to the work of anthropology curators and an overview of the Museum’s ethnographic collections. At the Library Friends event, Ben Williams, associate librarian, exhibited a num- ber of interesting and important botanical works from the Mary W. Runnells Rare Book Room. These included the original illustrations by Charles Millspaugh for his work, Medicinal Plants, published in 1892. It was on the basis of this work that Millspaugh was chosen to help organize the botanical aspects of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, which in turn led to his appoint- ment as Field Museum’s first curator of botany. William Burger, curator of vascular plants in the Museum’s Botany Department, continued the program, pointing out that modern scientific botanical illus- tration is a direct descendant from the earliest printed herbals of the 15th century. Like those early books, which were devoted largely to medicinal and poi- John Weinstein / GN86131.7 LIBRARY FRIENDS AND COLLECTIONS COMMITTEE MEET sonous plants, modern illustrations help to identify particular species and to disseminate botanical knowledge. Museum members interested in joining the work of the Collections Committee or the Friends of the Library are invited to call Heidi Bloom in the Development Office at (312) 322-8874. John Weinstein / GN86063.31 William Burger talks about the his- tory of botanical illustration. At the inaugural meeting of the Col- lections Committee, Jim and Louise Glass- er, the committee co-chairs, admire a Sande sculpture from West Africa being described by Jonathan Haas, vice president for collec- tions and research. BUSHMAN’S BABY PICTURES By Ron Dorfman Editor, In the Field he Field Museum has received two photographs of Bushman taken when the famous gorilla was an infant being cared for in a missionary camp in West Africa. He grew up — to six-feet-two and nearly 600 pounds — in Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo and his body has been on display in the Field Museum since his death in 1951. John Fletcher Allen of Belle Mead, New Jersey, son of the Chicago-based Presbyterian missionaries, said his wife, Nancy, discovered the Bushman baby pictures in a family album. Although one version of the family lore, published in the Field Museum Bulletin in February 1987, had it that the baby gorilla wan- dered into the camp in Elat, Cameroon, in 1928 and that the local people were unable to find its mother, Mr. Allen’s recollection, fortified by copies of his par- ents’ letters to friends and col- leagues, is consider- ably less sanguine. “The truth of the story is that Bush- man’s mother was killed by African hunters in Mbal- mayo, about 50 miles south of Yaounde, and the hunters found the baby nearby and brought it into camp,” he said. Other accounts vary in important details, or simply omit them. Floyd S. Young, then director of the Lincoln Park Zoo, wrote in 1939 that when Bushman “was captured by J.L. Buck, of Camden, N .J., on a bend of the N’Ja River . . . he was a nursing baby. That was early in the spring of 1929.” No word there of what or whom he was nursing on. Timothy J. and Magdalene Wise Tuomey, who have writ- ten extensively about Bushman, recount that the gorilla “was a mere babe when a village chieftain wounded his mother, driving her deep into the forest.” The Tuomeys, writing in the Chicago Tribune in 1978, said that the chief took the infant home and “hired a nursemaid” to care for him. A missionary, identified by the Tuomeys as “Dr. W.C. Johnson” but perhaps Rey. Dr. W.J. Johnston, field secretary of the Yaounde District of the Presbyterian mission, bought the animal from the chief to keep as a pet, and later agreed 293949 CAMEROON eKumbas to allow Buck to sell him to an American zoo for a share of the proceeds, according to the Tribune account. Mr. Allen’s parents were James Blaine and Annie Mary Allen, missionaries from the Fourth Presbyterian Church on Michigan Avenue. James Allen was an architect who built several churches in Cameroon, including one in the capital, Yaounde. He used the mis- sion’s $500 from the sale of Bushman to com- mission a stained-glass window for the Yaounde church by a Chicago artist. The window is on the theme “Suffer the little children to come unto me” (Mark 10:14), and the Christ figure is depicted with African features, “which was a little avant-garde for 1930,” said John Allen, who was baptized there in 1932. James Allen died that year, apparently of a poisonous insect bite, when John was seven months old. Neither the archives of the Fourth Presbyte- rian Church nor those of the Pres- byterian Board of Foreign Missions record the name of the artist, and efforts to reach church officials in Yaounde could not be completed before this issue of In the Field went to press. “Mother wrote a diary, and I wish I could find it,” John Allen said. After his father died, John and his older sister, Barbara, returned to Chicago with Mrs. Allen, who became “girls’ work director” at Fourth Church. He recalls going with his mother to visit Bushman in the Lincoln Park Zoo, and later seeing the mounted gorilla in the Field Museum with his own sons, now grown. “In Chicago, we lived on the Near North Side, and Mother would take me to see Bush- man at the Lincoln Park Zoo,” he said. “One day she was talking to him in Bulu, the local Bantu dialect, and one of the guards came along and asked what she was doing. She explained that she had raised Bushman in the Cameroons and the guard took her to see Mar- lin Perkins [then director of the Zoo]. Mother and Mr. Perkins had a long chat about the care and feeding of low- land gorillas.” Annie Mary Allen and the children returned to Cameroon, then a French colony, in 1939, and were en route when World War II broke out in Europe. They Foumben ° “Bafoussam orf) Dose remained in Africa for the duration of the war, and John kept another young gorilla and a chimpanzee as pets. Years later, on visits to Chica- go with his sons David and Bruce, Mr. Allen would bring them to the Field Museum to see Bushman. He recalls them saying mischievously, ”~There’s your brother!” Now 59, John Allen is assistant distribution manager for Westvaco Corp. in New York City. Bushman died on January 1, 1951 at the age of 23. The next day, his body was acces- sioned by the Field Museum as specimen No. Z-9815, “1 gorilla in the flesh (Bushman).” A value of $1,000 was placed on the specimen, which was a gift of the Lincoln Park Zoo, although estimates of Bushman’s worth when he was alive ranged to $250,000. The American Association of Zoological Parks and Aquari- ums once declared him “the most outstanding animal in any zoo in the world and the most valuable.” The hide was prepared by Field Museum taxidermists Leon Walters and Frank Wonder for a model sculpted by Joe Krstolich, The finished mount, in its now-familiar pose, was loaned to the Zoo for temporary exhibit in October and November of 1951. There was a flurry of newspaper speculation that the Zoo would refuse to return it to the Museum. In a memorandum for the record, Museum Director Clifford C. Gregg reported a conversation with George Donoghue, general superintendent of the Chicago Park District, who assured him that this was not the case: “He pointed out that Mr. Perkins did not desire to keep the animal permanently, even if it were available, and that a mounted specimen would be out of keeping with the rest of the Zoo and in competition with the young gorillas now at Lincoln Park.” On December 5, 1951, the Bushman case was installed in Stanley Field Hall just south of the fighting elephants. In 1986, taxider- mist Paul Brunsvold refur- bished the mount, applying a lanolin solution to — soften and condition the skin, reglazing the eyes, and brushing and combing the fur. Bushman was then moved downstairs to a post near the Chil- | dren’s Store, where he stands today, an enduring and endear- ing part of Chicago’s history. 285013 January/February 1992 Diane Alexander White / GN86060.26 EXHIBIT OPENS TO WILD APPLAUSE he Museum’s stunning new exhibit “Into the Wild: Animals, Trails & Tales” opened in November to excellent press notices and public enthusiasm, Among the activities accompanying the exhibit opening in the Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Wing were a special breakfast tour for Chicago cab drivers, two nights of members’ previews, a preview for the press, and the grand opening featuring Ronald McDonald, And in December, the wild cat himself helped give away “Garfield’s Wild Embassy Suites Party” in conjunction with WUSN-FM. James Balodimas/ GN86106,19 Diane Alexander White / GN86061.18 Curator of birds Scott Lanyon is interviewed by CBS Radio reporter John Hultman at press preview (above). Cabs filled the North Parking Lot for Taxi Day (right). Below, 11-year-old Scott Rosen of Deerfield, in a wheelchair after surgery on his leg, was the winner of “Garfield’s witp Embassy Suites Party,” a six-hour bash for 25 of his closest friends, raffled during a special promotion by country-music radio station WUSN-FM. With Garfield and Scott are other members of Boy Scout Troop 50 and their scoutmaster, Howard Rosen, who is also Scott’s dad. Diane Alexander White / GN86139,36 Diane Alexander White / GN86107,27 Diane Alexander White / GN86108.21 Diane Alexander White / GN86108.20 Above, Steve Robi- net, technical assis- tant in the division of insects, shows vis- itors some of the Museum’s collection during opening fes- tivities, while others (below) examine the curious contents of coughed-up owl pel- lets. Bottom left, John Wagner of the Department of Edu- cation demonstrates the live video imag- ing of the animal activities in a drop of water, and Ronald McDonald (bottom right) introduces kids to the bears that don’t play in Soldier Field. “Into the Wild” is located in the Muse- um/‘s Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Wing. The Rice Foundation provided major funding for the exhibit. The Ronald McDonald Chil- dren’s Charities con- tributed funds to help enhance the exhibit as a family experience. A SEPARATE VISION Separate Vision” explores the ten- sion between tradition and individ- uality, and between art and craft, in the work of four contemporary Native American artists. The exhib- it is in the Webber Gallery, January 24 through Apmil 5. The four artists work in different mediums. They are Baje Whitethorne, a Navajo land- scape painter; Nora Naranjo-Morse, a Santa Clara sculptor; John Fredericks, a Hopi kachi- na carver; and Brenda Spencer, a Navajo weaver. In addition to showcasing the innovative work of these artists, the exhibit documents problems facing Native American artists that “mainstream” artists never encounter. Every artist seeks to convey a personal vision of the world. Madern Native American artists, however, also feel responsible for preserving and transmitting their traditions and cul- tures. Each of the artists in this exhibit has developed a unique way of resolving this ten- sion. It is this separate vision that makes the four controversial. Collectors of Indian art often insist on seeing the same types of art that 66 LAND OF they first encountered perhaps 50 years ago. But Native American artists today need to draw not only on traditional values and forms but also on their personal experi- ences as young people in the last decades of the 20th century. Each of the four artists claims three main influences: the Native American heritage; a dis- tinct tribal culture; and his or her individuality. The exhibit explores how these separate yet interlocked components play vital roles in their art. The exhibit also looks at how the artists deal with out- side pressures that would limit their power of expres- sion to traditional modes. All four have resisted art-market forces that reward. confor- mity. They have also weath- ered controversy that ensued as they ignored both outsiders and those among their own people who insisted that they create “stan- GREEN LIGHTNING n The Land of 66 Green Light- ning: Wildlife of the Mayan Realm” features photographs by con- servationist/biologist Thor Janson. It opened in the South Gallery December 31 and runs through March 8. Janson, who lives in Guatemala, de- signed the exhibit in such a way that visi- tors are taken on a journey through the diverse tropical eco- systems of “Maya- land,” Janson’s term for the ancient realm of the Maya Indians in what are now southern Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and El & Salvador. There are at least 12 dis- | tinct ecological zones in the region. Janson’s photographs cover everything from coastal | mangrove forests, jungles, and swamps to volcanic peaks, savannas and deserts. Each ecosystem plays host to a variety of interesting occupants, including many endangered species. Janson captures on film the jaguar, the margay, the manatee, and the resplendent quet- zal, whose tail feathers were sacred to the Mayas and were used as currency. Even today, feather (below) The legendary quetzal bird (above) and a quetzal a Guatemalan coin bears its name. The first Mayan people probably arrived in Central America over 5,000 years ago, where their culture soon flour- ished. They devel- oped a complex social structure, a system of hieroglyphic writing, and an advanced mas- tery of mathematics and astronomy. They were also the archi- tects of enormous, majestic pyramids and sprawling cities, the ruins of which can be seen in the exhibit. Janson has includ- ed photos of the spec- tacular Mayan ruins found in areas like Yaxilan, Tikal, Palenque, and Copan, so |, that viewers can at least get an idea of the complexity and beauty of Mayan architecture. Today, there are several mil- lion Maya in Mexico and Cen- tral America, speaking more than 30 dialects of their dis- tinctive language. The naturales, or “Natural People,” as they prefer to be called, still live much as they have for thousands of years, and the exhibit includes photos of the modern-day Mayan peo- ple and their lifestyle. dard” Native American art. The exhibit, conceived and produced by Dr. Linda Eaton, a curator of ethnology at the Museum of Northern Arizona, was funded by the Flinn Foundation of Phoenix, Arizona. It includes some 30 pieces of original art as well as photos and text. There is also a 40-minute video that documents the artists’ work. DIV —— ‘