REPORTS OF THE MUSEUM COMMITTEE
THE ACADEMY JOURNAL

I

        The Academy Museum has just completed its second year of renewed activities since its restoration after a prolonged period of inactivity reaching back to before the Benade Hall fire.

        Mrs. Viola Ridgway opens the Museum one morning and one afternoon a week providing easy access to individual visitors and classes. Mrs. Ridgway has continued her enthusiastic and imaginative support of the uses of the Museum by developing a children's hour during which the children of primary school age are offered the now rare experience of hearing Miss Erna Sell-ner tell Greek myths, and the older cliildren are offered various other folk stories (now Zulu) told by Mrs. Ridgway. An average of 20 have attended these weekly story hours.

         The Museum has been open for visitors two evenings a week by Jeffrey Bellinger, our college man, who also cleans, moves heavy objects, and repairs broken objects. The four open sessions, together with a number of special appointments, have enabled approximately 700 visitors including a number of classes to visit the Museum. Miss Margaret Wilde has given invaluable service to the Museum this year acting as executive secretary to the Museum Committee. In her prompt and thorough way she has overseen everything from repairs of roof leaks to shipment of our latest acquisitions. She has systematically taken inventory of the Lanzone collection and the antique vase collection, and is now working on the American Indian collection. This has not been done since 1916, so she is preparing a complete new catalogue which is now being typed by our expert typist, Mrs. Sydney Heldon. From this inventory Miss Wilde reports that 31 out of 1104 pieces of the Lanzone collection are missing; 4 out of 106 antique vases. This is not considered bad for 100 years of school boys climbing in and out of and dusting the Museum, and four moves into different quarters! Miss Wilde has also overseen repair work and remounting lor which task she has consulted with the Head Conserva-tionist of the University of Pennsylvania. The conservationist, Miss Greene, came out to visit our Museum on April 23, 1974, and Miss Wilde has written a full report based on recommendations for repairs, and has made a list of museum resource personnel to contact for expert advice on restoration in different areas.

        We deeply appreciate the many gifts and loans we have received this year. Reverend and Mrs. Daniel Goodenough and Mr. and Mrs. Robert Klein have provided us with some worn oriental rugs to cover our bare floors; Mr. Edward Bostock has lent us several Chinese objects, among them an inlaid stirrup belonging to Genghis Khan! Mrs. Raymond Pitcairn has again given the Academy a number of incredibly important Medieval pieces, 18 pieces from 12th to 14th century France. The wedding dress of Mary Pitcairn Ritchie recently modeled at the Theta Alpha Banquet has been given to the Academy Museum by her great-granddaughter, Mrs. Mary Brennan.

        Early this year Mrs. Frank Coulson advised us of the need of the Kensington Society of the General Conference to give up three bas-reliefs carved by the famous sculptor, John Flaxman. Since John Flax-man was an original member of the first New.Church society with Robert Hind-marsh and William Blake, the Kensington Society hoped that these sculptures could remain in New Church hands and not be sold on the open market. Being aware of the fine mythological drawings as well as the famous designs Flaxman made for the Wedgwood pottery, we were excited at the potential value these reliefs ("For Thine is the Kingdom", "Deliver us from evil", and "Mercury bringing Pandora to Earth") would be to our museum collection. Having consulted with the proper authorities here, we started negotiations for (he procurement of these reliefs. We especially appreciate the thoughtfulncss of Mrs. Coulson and Mr. Geoffrey Turner, secretary of the Kensington Society, for alerting us to the pending sale, and Mr. and Mrs. Geoffrey Dawson's generous offer of their time and expert judgment in acting as our London agents. The latest word from Miss Wilde is that the reliefs are in the hands of the packers.

        The Museum Committee has spent a lot of time deliberating over its various responsibilities such as conservation, use of the museum, and acquisitions. If we try to acquire new objects should they be additions to our major collections or should we try to fill in gaps? Over the two years we have been active we have developed a Philosophy and Objectives in order to clarify our goals and purposes in our own minds and for those who take over the work after us. Needless to say this has led to many stimulating discussions as well as deadening frustrations. We are now working on Areas of Acquisitions; this will have to be an ongoing development for several reasons: hopefully our vision will improve as we get further into the work; even if we knew exactly what we wanted, would we find them for sale? When objects do come up for auction, can we summon the back ground for judgment and arrange for the approval of funds quickly enough to make the right purchases?

        With this problem in mind the Reverend Robert Junge spent two days in New York last December studying and bidding on some objects for sale at a Sotheby-Parke-Bernet auction. He gained some valuable experience as well as some fine objects including a bronze sword, c. 1700 B.C. (to illustrate the Bronze Age) and a hideous Syro-Phoenician Baal, c. 2500 B.C. (to dramatize the horrors of idolatry). Mr. Junge has kindly put these objects on loan in the museum with our option to buy when we can make unrushed judgments.

        Our work has been specially supported this year by generous contributions from the Glcncnirn and Cairncrest Foundations and Mrs. Hugh Brown. We appreciate the fact that individual members of the Academy Board have given us personal encouragcmcnt as well as collective financial suport .  Realizing that there had boon no major purchases made since 1927, the decision was made to set aside a special sum of money entirely for acquisitions to be used
within the next two or three years. This was a happy day for the Museum Committee. Strangely, providentially, the opportunity to buy the Flaxman friezes followed within a week or two. Although we had time to think and present our request to the Board, in this case, the members of the Board soon realized that it was important for the Museum Committee to have the freedom to spend a portion of the alloted money without having to present each case
to them.

        In general we see three levels of responsi-bility in what we call our Museum Project] The first and most conspicuous is the oper-ating of the physical plant itself: the con-servation, display, purchases, and use of the objects themselves. This involves a multitude of details such as cleaning, labeling, cataloguing, opening the room, describing me collection, advertising it to teachers, Blinding objects for display in other buildings. The second level of responsibility in development is the intellectual level where we offer programs, lectures, and stimulation to the imagination, such as in our story hour for children.

        This year we have expanded beyond some of our wildest dreams in this intellectual level. It has been the custom of the Museum Committee to have presentations bydifferent members at each committee meeting; we were inspired by a preview of Mr. Prescott Rogers' talks on Hinduism -- our preview was on Hindu Philosophy. We pave been most fortunate in having Mr. Nishan Yardumian appointed to our committee as our expert medievalist. Nishan has a great appreciation for the religious significance of Romanesque and Gothic art and architecture, and intends to take Bourses next year to increase his knowledge in these special fields. We have confidence that Nishan will be of inestimable help in conveying to the students some appreciation for the priceless heritage of art and religious history we have in the Cathedral, the Glen-fftairn collection, and the museum's medieval collection. Nishan gave our committee a tantalizing morsel of what depths of beauty and feeling are contained in a granite carving of a "Descent from the Cross." Ow-ling to the generosity of Mrs. Raymond Pitcaim, we have continued to have the professional advice of Mr. Thomas Miller ofNew York; Mr. Miller is guiding and advising Mr. Yardumian in his further education.

Mr. Austin Arrington stimulated an audience for three weekly slide talks on the ancient civilizations of Pompeii, and North land South America. His photography is outstanding, and his enthusiasm will surely spur on future archeologists.

        The Museum was honored to sponsor one of our own committee members in a series of three lectures on the ancient re-ligions of India. Mr. Prescott Rogers is taking courses at Temple University working toward a Ph.D. in Judaic studies and was set afire by his studies of the Indian religions. Those who attended were treated to a scholarly description of the subject always bathed in the substance of the New Church question: were these religions and philosophies given birth by the Ancient Church Specific?

        Those interested in the Museum Projects were this year treated to a remarkable and beautiful example of the workings of Providence. We don't know exactly what it means, but we do know it was a very wonderful experience. Two years ago when we spoke of the necessity for the Academy to get back to its first love, a systematic study of correspondences, we mentioned hieroglyphics as a strangely symbolic and concrete beginning of that study. Several of those who helped our project get off the ground have had an enduring interest in hieroglyphics -- this intriguing, ancient, "holy," writing. But very few people realized what a great and sudden impact would be made on our work by the modest, mild-mannered man who trudged up and down the road to the library and museum carrying Egyptian tomes and scanning the stone carvings. One day we asked him when he was going to let us in on what he was doing in the museum; he seemed startled and embarrassed; two weeks later, however, Ralph Brown called and announced that he was ready. We immediately arranged the first of three inspirational seminars up in the evening quiet of the Museum. Those who were privileged to attend felt the warmth and love of a man who was seeing everywhere in Egyptian hieroglyphics the sure sign that the Ancient Church had been in Egypt. Encouraged by the active interest of a score of people, he made a supreme elfort for such a modest man and agreed to teach a course in hieroglyphics to be sponsored by the Museum. Notices were sent to the Faculty, and a few students were told. Much to our amazement twenty-two people turned up ranging from sophomores in high school to a senior professor in the college. The joy of new beginnings could be seen in each face; the feeling that we were embarking on a wonderful voyage under the guidance of a man with a very strong love for the Church. On the morning of the second of the scheduled weekly classes Ralph Brown passed into the spiritual world. The shock and feelings of sorrow and of terrible disappointment lasted only a short time as we began to see that he had died a happy man and that he had ulti-mated the study by holding that first class. We missed that week's class, but pulled ourselves together and announced a class for the next week under the guidance of Mr. Stephen Cole, a young but determined scholar, who has managed, with the help of Gardiner's Egyptian grammar, to stay several days ahead of the class. Stephen has shown imagination, fine judgment, and analytical discernment; we very much appreciate the courage and dedication it has taken for him to step into this time-consuming and sometimes arduous job. We could not have gone ahead without the wise counsel and deep interest of Mrs. Joel Pitcairn who is studying hieroglyphics at the University of Pennsylvania. Mrs. Robert Junge, who has had a scholarly interest in New Church Egyptology for a number of years, continued to supply us with a wealth of remarkable quotations from early manuscripts confirming at every turn that the Ancient Church was in Egypt. Mr. Charles Cole, always a patron of scholars, has encouraged this study from the beginning, printing up Mr. Brown's first few lessons and continuing to show enthusiasm as a student. Mr. Kenneth Rose, Professor Richard Gladish, Mrs. Junge, Mr. Leich Latta and Miss Kim Bostock have each contributed special reports enriching and heartening us as we plow through Gardiner's grammar.

        We have had ten weekly classes, the attendance never falling below fourteen -- and that with no coercion and no credit. Surely there is no place in the world where fifteen to twenty people are making an informal but serious study of hieroglyphics and that for the purpose of learning more about the Ancient Church! Ralph Brown really started something.

        The hieroglyphics class is on the second "level" of responsibilities for the Museum, but it is bordering on the third level; the fact that it is an organized, scheduled class with set hours, chairs and table, a set grammar to go through keeps it on the second level under the classification of a program, but the intangible unknowns that we are searching for puts it partly into the third level: this is New Church research into correspondences and the life and spirit of the various churches. For this the Museum was reactivated; in appearance this third level may only materialize as a file and a newsletter. The Museum Committee has recognized the establishment of the file as a primary use and has authorized Mr. Stephen Cole to spend a minimum of fifty hours this spring collecting and organizing primary (the Writings), secondary (New Church collateral), and tertiary (relevant secular) materials.

        In his first report to us Stephen has analyzed the file as it now stands. Although he notes that it simply represents the interests of those who have contributed the material, he does find a common theme and suggests the approximate label "materials for the study of the wisdom of the ancients] or the Science of Correspondences as it has] been known through the ages." He further states: "This is not entirely satisfactory but; is a broad enough categorization to include the cave paintings of Lascaux and Jungian psychology." He also recommends the use, of an historical approach (in general through the History of the Churches) as well as a topical approach (headings such as Art, Language, Myth and Legend, Symbolism and the Hermetic tradition).Our experience for the last two years is one of ever-expanding avenues of research and development, and we are looking for ward to continuing at our astronomical rate of growth next year. We are particularly pleased that Mr. Pryke, who has guided and encouraged our project from the beginning, prill remain on board as Chairman of the Libraries Committee and will therefore continue to oversee our work.

Aubrey C. Odhner
Chairman

          The pace of museum activities has not slackened during this school year of 1974-75.  

         On the practical level, Miss Wilde has overseen an amazing number of tasks which bring us up-to-date and gives us a firm footing for future expansion. Not the least of these is the total inventory and complete set of new catalogues. By the end of this summer, Mrs. Heldon will have completed typing the new catalogue of all pieces acquired by the Museum since the first edition of catalogues was made, probably in 1916. (There was no date on them!) This volume will then be added to the new editions of the Lanzone, the Greek Vase, and the American Indian catalogues. In connection with this catalogue work, Miss Wilde has just sent a letter to the Turin Museum in Italy, seat of Prof. Lanzone's operations 100 years ago, asking if they have any records of his mythological collection, which is now in our possession. Turin is said to have the finest Egyptian collection outside of Cairo.

        Last spring we asked the head of conservation from the University of Pennsylvania to look at our collection and recommend necessary repairs. We are very happy to say that by the end of this month all recommended repairs will have been completed by their conservation department. The speed and efficiency with which they have worked, the tasteful mountings and the minimal charges for their work have been almost breathtaking. We are impressed with what a great privilege it is to be working with such a professional and dedicated organization.

        We have been fortunate in having Ralph Horner as our college student worker this year. Not only does Ralph keep the Museum open two nights a week doing heavy cleaning and handy man jobs, but he has demonstrated his ability to do fine carpentry work in the construction of three easels to hold the newly acquired Flaxman sculptures. We are very grateful to the men at the cathedral workshop, especially to Mr. Al Walter, for their friendly cooperation in the building of three easels and in their expert help in moving some of our heavy stone pieces.

        Once more we thank Mrs. Raymond Pitcairn for her gift of a number of very important medieval pieces, some of which were already on loan to the Museum, but some newly acquired. One of these pieces, new to our Museum and remarkable to own is a head of a Magi, almost certainly done by Giselbertus. Giselbertus is the most famous name that has come down to us from Romanesque sculpture. The head is from the cathedral at Autun, in Burgundy, where the rest of the capital stands today. We are also appreciative of the generous gift from the Theodore Pitcairn family of the very fine Chinese and Egyptian pieces which have been on loan to the Museum for a number of years. It is with feelings of warm affection that we recall the Reverend Theodore Pitcairn's presence at the reopening reception we had in the Museum four years ago. His apparent approval of our recent work seemed to link us with the early days of the Museum's development. The family of Mr. John Walter, metal worker for the cathedral many years ago, generously donated a large, beautifully worked seven branched candlestick to the Museum. This is a most welcome gift for its beauty and religious nature.

        The Museum Committee is continuing its efforts to make contacts with those most knowledgeable and expert in the field where our strongest collections lie. In this connection we are indebted to Mrs. Willard Pendleton for the opportunity afforded us to meet a number of the leaders of the art world of Philadelphia at Glencairn in October. Among them was the director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In conversation with some of the officials of the Art Museum we found them quite impressed with our Flaxman acquisitions and interested in the possibility of putting together a Flaxman show. This would seem to have tremendous possibilities in acquainting the art world with the source of much of Flaxman's inspiration, the Writings of Swedenborg.

        Last year we carried on a series of children's story hours by Mrs. Ridgway and Miss Erna Sellner, a beginner's Hieroglyphics class and several short lecture programs. We have continued these and have this year added a short lecture series by Mrs. Edward Alien on Correspondences of Gardens, one by Mr. Nishan Yardumian on Medieval Art, culminating in a lecture on stained glass by Mr. Ariel Gunther, and tours to the Bryn Athyn Cathedral and the Cloisters in New York. Mr. Stephen Cole is repeating his beginner's course in Hieroglyphics while an advanced course is [being conducted privately by a graduate student from the University of Pennsylvania. Mr, Kenneth Rose has started a two-year purse in New Testament Greek.
        Other trips and tours are being arranged by the Museum Committee, one to the Rosenwald Galleries in Jenkintown to see [Blake and Flaxman originals, and one to the Metropolitan Museum in New York to see their spectacular exhibit of Scythian gold. [Plans are now being considered to organize a Museum Association; the feeling is that there is widespread interest in and support of Museum work among the New Church public at large; this interest and involvement would be encouraged by such an organization which might provide a newsletter, arrange for opportunities to contribute ideas and work for the Museum, and give early notification Of special classes, tours, and other events. The Museum Committee continues to be an imaginative, dynamic group, with endless ideas for development and expansion. This bear we have welcomed Miss Martha Gyllenhaal to our midst. Martha, having recently returned to the Art staff at the Academy, brings with her the youthful enthusiasm of a well-trained, well-travelled art teacher, with a deep appreciation for the distinctive work we are trying to do in the Museum in connection with correspondences |and symbols. Miss Mary Alice Carswell has had to resign from the committee because the press of her new duties as head Librarian will prevent her from spending the time she would like to on Museum work. We have appreciated her knowledge of the history of the Museum's operation, gained by her years of constant effort to keep the Museum afloat. We also will miss her special interest in certain areas of Museum work, especially in that of Christian art and symbolism and in the ecclesiastical vestments. She has contributed several short, but informative talks on these and other subjects to our committee meetings. We know we are not really losing the benefit of her vast background as she will be constantly available for counsel, working, as she does, in the same building.

        Mr. Stephen Cole has worked fifty hours this year analyzing and organizing our Research File which is at the core of our work. It is now ready and waiting for contributions of material which throws light on the spiritual and religious life of ancient man, correspondences and symbolism through the ages, and the Five Churches and their Revelations. We hope any such material will be sent to Miss Margaret Wilde who will keep it for periodic filing by Stephen. We also invite anyone doing research bordering on these areas to make use of this file.

        The future seems to hold nothing but pleasant challenges in this work. We look forward with the utmost optimism to the developing programs of the next few years.

Aubrey C. Odhner
Chairman

        Each time we look back over a Museum year, we expect to find that the excitement of the Museum's "new look" has subsided into a dull routine of repetition and day-by-day statistics. But the committee continues to generate new ideas and explore new territory.

        Late last spring we were told that we would have to find another home for the Museum while the Library roof was being repaired. But the administration was sympathetic to our cries of horror, and instead gave us manpower to safeguard the precious objects. The students who helped caught our enthusiasm, and one of them, Geraldo Gomes, became our invaluable student worker for the year. When the repairs were done he refused to put things back where they had been, but stayed late each evening, -- urging us into a total rearrangement, painting, polishing, and repairing, and had us sparklingly prepared for the Ancient Church Conference in August.

        The potential usefulness of the Museum for study and development has long inspired the Committee to wish the expansion" of involvement and responsibility. To this end, in consultation with Bishop King, it has organized a Museum Association. Details (worked out by Martin Pryke's subcommittee), and an invitation to join have appeared in Church periodicals. Response was enthusiastic, and a large group of new members gathered in the Museum for a teception on April 23.
 
        A full schedule of classes and programs has continued. Mrs. Ridgway is still giving her mythological story hour. Stephen Cole is in his third year of Hieroglyphics classes for beginners. Kenneth Rose is ending his second year of a two-year course on New Testament Greek. Martha Gyllenhall, a lively and enterprising committee member, is teaching her high-school art history course in the Museum, and hopes for an adult evening series on calligraphy next year.

 
        The Museum has also sponsored lectures and films in Pendleton Hall: "The Secret of the Pyramids," by Stephen Cole, two Andre Girard films, and a Bible-archaeology film introduced by Prescott Rogers. A college-age open house, and a series of art-history films, have been offered after Doctrinal Classes.

        The Museum Association has already enjoyed trips to the Cloisters, the Metropolitan Museum, and the Brooklyn Museum. Mrs. Robert Gladish, our able coordinator for these trips, has compiled a list of museums within a day's reach.

        Committee Meetings feature a short educational presentation. Siri Yardumian showed her own film on Chartres Cathedral. Prescott Rogers supplied commentary for a slide presentation on the Scythian gold exhibit, and Carey Smith told how the metal was worked. The Rev. Martin Pryke discussed the life and work of New Church artist Jean Jacque Gaillard, whose triptich is in the Museum. A series on New Church artists is hoped for. Notes on these programs go into our files for student reference.

        The cleaning of the Flaxman pieces will save a huge cost of professional work, and is also proving a valuable and exciting means of training our own conservation workers. A Pennsylvania University conservationist trained several of our students, and the work will continue through the summer under supervision of Geraldo Gomes and the committee.

        The hope has been that the Museum would become a study center and source of contact with outside scholars. This has been increasingly realized. Among the stimulating encounters were Margaret Wilde's with Dr. T. C. Mitchell of the Western Asia Division at the British Museum, and Prescott Rogers' with Penn Assyriologist Dr. Leichty, with whom he arranged to have the Museum's cuneiform tablets read. Penn possesses 50% of the world's literary cuneiform tablets, and in this providentially proximate center of ancient studies he has found news of exciting discoveries which will be reported in the Museum Association Newsletter.

        Lennart Alfelt chanced to accompany Prescott on a visit to Penn; Dr. Leichty was away, and they were taken to the curator of the tablet collection. He proved to be a Swede, Ake W. Sjoberg, from Upsala, with whom Lennart found many acquaintances in common. (Sjoberg is successor to the famous Noah Kramer.)

        A professor of Art History at Yale, Walter Cahn, has written to ask if he could publish pictures of our medieval pieces in a national art magazine which he edits. A graduate Egyptologist from the University of Munich, Thomas Liepsner, was referred to us by the Brooklyn Museum. We had a delightful visit with him; he gave us a number of corrections and some practical advice, which Stephen Cole recorded, identified our oldest piece -- what we thought was a "nothing" vase he told us was pre-dynastic Egyptian, c. 3200 B.C.! -- and promised continued contact as well as references to other interested scholars. Professor Cahn is to visit us on May 17.
 
        The committee remains cautious in matters of security and publicity, but these associations with the learned world can (and lready do) advance and encourage genuine New Church scholarship. We are awed by our custodial responsibility for these in valuable treasures given to the Academy's uses, and greatly privileged in the op-
portunities they afford.

Aubrey C. Odhner
Chairman 

        The Museum Committee is now completing its fifth active year in full operation. This report represents my last as chairman of that committee, not because our five years of steady expansion has finally come to an end, but because new uses have opened up to such an extent that we have found it necessary to reorganize.

        Dedicated to research into correspondences, and other related subjects, and organized around the historical concept of the Five Churches, the Museum work has continued to open up new horizons in never ending wonder. Last year saw the establishment of a Museum Association for the purpose of involving a larger group of the New Church community in our exciting work; this year we have started a Newsletter which has already reached a wider audience than we ever imagined.

        The newsletter itself serves the purpose of telling of our year's activities in more detail than is possible to record in this report. Briefly, we have provided two public lectures on Hebrew, one each on Great Tartary, on Africa, and on Symbolism in Flemist Painting. The committee has been treated to brief talks on New Church artists, accounts of European tours of committee members, a study of Greek vases, and Celtic manuscripts. Martha Gyllenhaal has offered the public a rich fare of movies and slides as well as a well subscribed 6 weeks calligraphy class. Continual reports come in from our well informed, on-campus Biblical-studies-committee member, Prescott Rogers; always alert to the latest publicity on interesting conferences and lectures, PAR has kept us up to date on the greatest find of the century, the discovery of the 3rd millennium city of Ebla, on conferences about scientific dating itself, and is at present making arrangements for the Academy to participate in an archeological dig in the Holy Land.

        Our work seems to be of such interest throughout the Church that five requests have been made for committee members to speak about the Museum and related topics. The Museum Association has sponsored trips to New York and Philadelphia museums and has enjoyed open houses at our Museum, and, at the kind invitation of Mrs. Raymond Pitcairn, at Glencairn. The latter involved a memorable afternoon savoring the arts of the Middle Ages arranged by Nishan and Siri Yardumian.

        A number of generous gifts have been received, in both objects and monetary contributions; perhaps the most encouraging aspect of the gifts we have received this year is that we are supported by old and young; in fact there is more than a seventy year age span between some of this years' contributors.

        The Museum continues to be a great attraction to scholars and world renowned art experts. About 30 of our Romanesque pieces will be published this summer in the magazine, Gesta, edited by Dr. Kahn of Yale University; the Cloisters, medieval branch of the Metropolitan Museum of New York, is hoping to sponsor an exhibit, in 2 or 3 years, involving about 100 of our pieces. Dr. Ake Sjoberg, foremost cuneiform expert, now at the University of Pennsylvania Museum, was interested enough in our cuneiform tablets that he took them in and had them cleaned, repaired, and completely translated.

        Our own ambitious conservation project is now completed; the three Flaxman pieces have been cleaned and remounted by Academy students; the cost was about one eighth of that estimated by the University of Pennsylvania Conservation Department, and the work was evaluated by those same professionals as "superb".

        The Museum project and all that it now entails developed originally out of the concept of an antiquities research center. Early this year I became increasingly concerned that the demanding nature of the museum project itself might cause us to lose sight of our original, less tangible objectives; I was also concerned that many important details were not being attended to and that many avenues of potential growth were being unnecessarily limited by the present organization. The dream is of a great department of the Academy where the science of sciences is restored, serving as an integrator where people as well as subjects find new, exciting and useful relationships. Because of this high dream and vast potential, 1 asked President Acton if he would give some thought to reorganizing the Museum structure. He has responded with enthusiasm and concrete evidence of the Academy's whole hearted support of the museum project, fact and dream, by appointing the Rev. Martin Pryke as Director of the Museum and Association with administrative responsibilities and has set up the office of Director of Museum Research, in official recognition of the importance to the Academy of this sort of developmental work.

        We have been well aware of Mr. Pryke's continuous interest in the Museum from the time when, as Executive Vice President, he appointed the first museum committee. His deep interest in and increasing knowledge of the museum work, as well as his ability and experience promise well for the future of the museum.

        It is with only a little sadness and a great sense of relief and high hopes that I shift my responsibilities from chairmanship of the Museum Committee to concentration on the more efficient organization of research programs. 1 look back on many happy and wonderful hours spinning dreams with the Museum Committee, but forward to an even closer relationship with the Museum Committee in the things about which we care the most.

Aubrey C. Odhner
Chairman