We regret to record the resignation from the Museum Board of Mr. B. Franklin Pepper in order to give his services to the Government. Mr. Pepper, who has gone to Fort Niagara, has been a member of the Museum Board since December, 1905, and has during that time been its Secretary.
Mrs. Charles Brinton Coxe has presented to the Museum a set of Curtis’ “North American Indian” in eleven volumes of text and eleven folios of plates. This publication, which deals in succession with all the Indian tribes in America north of Mexico, is a work which is highly esteemed by all students of the Indian as well as by others whose interest is centered in the artistic side of the native American life and its surroundings. The copy which the Museum is now so fortunate as to possess was the property of the late President of the Museum, Mr. Eckley B. Coxe, Jr.
The Library of the Museum has received from Mr. Charles P. Bowditch of Boston a copy of a Quiche-Spanish and Spanish-Quiche dictionary. The original of this work was written by an anonymous Franciscan priest of Guatemala. The manuscript is a copy made, probably, at Zacapula, Guatemala, in 1787 by Fermin Joseph Tirado, who announces the fact that he knows the Quiche language. The copy presented to the Museum is a photographic copy made by the photostat process.
Miss Lydia T. Morris has added a piece of Roman glass to the John Thompson Morris Collection and has also presented eleven pieces of Russian enamel work.
Mr. Samuel P. Hanson has presented to the Museum two hammocks of native workmanship from the west coast of Africa. One of these hammocks was made in 1870 and was exhibited at the Centennial Exhibition.
A Babylonian seal cylinder with engraved design representing the owner being presented to a goddess by an intermediary has been acquired by purchase.
Chinese porcelains, formerly in the Morgan Collection, to the number of sixty-six have been selected and purchased by the Museum.
Mrs. J. William White has presented a collection of American and Indian pottery, together with an Egyptian mummied cat.
The Alaskan collections have been increased by the purchase of a collection from the Tanana River, obtained by Mr. Guy Madara. The Tinneh Indians of that region, who have until recently remained isolated, are now becoming so civilized that genuine specimens of their handiwork are rare.
A collection obtained among the Tlingit Indians of Southeastern Alaska by Mr. Louis Shotridge has been received at the Museum.
Messrs. Probst and Wight of the Africa Inland Mission stationed at Aldai, British East Africa, have sent a third consignment of the ethnological collections which they have been making among the natives of that region on behalf of the Museum.
Four Navajo blankets, one of them of great rarity and beauty of design, have been purchased.
A collection of ancient Mexican jewelry ornaments and amulets of jade and gold has been acquired by purchase. The collection contains also pottery images from Oaxaca and a stone effigy vase.
We record with very deep regret the death of Mrs. Louis Shotridge which took place at Haines, Alaska, at the mouth of the Chilkat River, on June 12. Mrs. Shotridge was the daughter of Scundo, a well-known medicine man of the Wolf party of the Chilkoots. Her mother was of the Thluqwonutdi clan of the Raven party of Chilkoot. From her childhood Mrs. Shotridge was known for her beauty of person and for her quite exceptional intelligence. During the three years that she spent with her husband in Philadelphia she became a well-known figure and a great favorite, especially with the children of the public schools whom she met frequently at the Museum and to whom she talked about the customs of her own people. Besides being an accomplished musician and a good storyteller, she had many gifts which gained for her the admiration and friendship of many people in Philadelphia.
A committee of the citizens of Philadelphia and friends of Mrs. Cornelius Stevenson, in recognition of her public service, have presented to the Museum a portrait of Mrs. Stevenson painted by Mr. Leopold Seiffert. The portrait is hung in the library with a tablet bearing the following inscription.
Sara Yorke Stevenson, Sc. D.
Curator of the Egyptian Section 1890 to 1905
Secretary November 1894 to January 1904
and
President January 1904 to February 1905
of the
Free Museum of Science and Art
of the
University of Pennsylvania