Scientific Grandpa

The Smithsonian Institution, custodian of the nation's giraffes and Rembrandts, collector of historic aircraft and coffee mills, and authority on bugs, fish and Indians, last week was celebrating its centennial. It was a good occasion also for recalling its little-known founder: James Smithson, an Englishman who never saw the U.S.

In the 1760s, Sir Hugh Smithson, Duke of Northumberland, took up with Elizabeth Keate Macie, reputed descendant of Henry VII. One result: a son, James Smithson, who became a leading chemist, but because of the bar sinister never a duke. Wrote he: "On my father's side I am a Northumberland, on my mother's I am related to kings, but this avails me not. My name shall live in the memory of man when the titles of the Northumberlands and the Percys are extinct and forgotten."

What he meant he made clear in his will. If a nephew proved childless, then his property would go to the "United States of America, to found at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men."

Smithson died in 1829; his nephew died childless in 1835. The U.S. got the money ($508,318.46 in gold sovereigns), and finally in 1846 set up the Institution. The bequest was large for those days, and with better luck or backing, the Smithsonian might have become the nation's scientific center. But it got no heavy support from the Government or anyone else. For the current fiscal year the Government appropriated $1,452,512 and most of this was earmarked for nonscientific custodial work.

Nation's Attic. From the moment of foundation, the Smithsonian was overwhelmed by an embarrassing flood of "national treasures": stuffed animals, historical relics, antiques, paintings, statues. Most had little to do with the "diffusion of knowledge."

Under the first chief, Physicist Joseph Henry, the Smithsonian's scientists, trying to do "pure research" amid the clutter, kept fairly close to the main stream of scientific progress. They set up an effective weather reporting system before the Weather Bureau, did important work in other fields. Later chiefs also had their triumphs; Samuel Pierpont Langley, the most famous, worked out the principles of the airplane before the Wright brothers made one that would fly.

But for the most part, Smithsonian scientists stuck to "description," that amiable super-hobby which leads learned men to scour the earth for rarities. Working always on a shoestring, they explored the West, dug up dinosaurs, collected insects, mollusks, birds, minerals.

Blameless Labor. Among the more recent publications of the Smithsonian are reports on the catfish of Venezuela and the songs of the Chitimacha Indians of Louisiana. Every detail of nature, Smithsonian men insist, is worth attention for itself alone.

Some outside scientists, planning for the atomic age, smile at the old Smithsonian. But others are slightly envious. Smithsonian researchers do not have to teach. Their work, though it often proves useful, need have no practical applications. And out of their blameless labors will come no demons, no man-made plagues, no bombs or poisons for the world to exorcise.

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