Museum of Comparative Zoology
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The Museum of Comparative Zoology is located on the grounds of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is one of three museums which collectively comprise the Harvard Museum of Natural History.
The museum was founded in 1859 through the efforts of Louis Agassiz and its is sometimes called "The Agassiz" after its founder. Agassiz designed the collection to illustrate the variety and comparative relationships of animal life.
The museum is comprised of twelve departments: Biological Oceanography, Entomology, Herpetology, Ichthyology, Invertebrate Paleontology, Invertebrate Zoology, Mammalogy, Marine Biology, Malacology, Ornithology, Population Genetics, and Vertebrate Paleontology. The Ernst Mayr Library and its archives join in supporting the work of the museum.
In contrast to more modern museums, the Museum of Comparative Zoology has many hundreds of stuffed animals on display. Notable exhibits include whale skeletons, the largest turtle shell ever found (eight feet long), "the Harvard mastodon", a the 50-foot long plesiosaur skeleton, the remains of a dodo and a coelacanth preserved in fluid.
Many of the exhibit entries also have historical significance, like a fossil sand dollar found by Charles Darwin in 1834, Captain Cook's mamo, and two pheasants that once belonged to George Washington.
This museum and the other institutions that comprise the Harvard Museum of Natural History are physically connected to the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology and one admission grants visitors access to all museums.
[edit] References
- The Museum of Comparative Zoology (homepage)
- Boston Phoenix; "Best Freak Show (Other than the Subway)"
- The Rarest of the Rare by Nancy Pick
