Natural History Museum

The Vassar College Natural History Museum was founded in 1864 as the Cabinet of Geology and Minerology and has existed in some form ever since. Throughout time, it has been housed in Main Building, Avery Hall and New England Building, before being distributed between Ely Hall and Olmsted Hall.

Vassar College Natural History Museum
Founded	1864

An etching of the Cabinet from 1867.

History

Cabinet of Geology and Minerology

Henry A. Ward, a Professor of Natural History at the University of Rochester, was hired in 1862 to assemble a museum for the College. In 1864, Ward constructed the Cabinet of Geology and Minerology on the 5th floor of Main. A smaller Cabinet of Natural History was also kept on the third floor. Yale professor James D. Dana described the collection as surpassing anything he had seen in the United States of Europe. Sanborn Tenney was hired in 1865 as Vassar's first Professor of Natural History. A student of Louis Agassiz, the famed Darwin critic, Tenney was a creationist and rejected the theory of evolution. Tenney was replaced by James Orton in 1869. Orton was a friend of Henry Ward and Charles Darwin, and served as manager of the collection until he died in 1877 in Peru on a collecting trip.

Vassar College Museum of Natural History

In 1874, the College's Riding Academy was decommissioned. This led to the collections being moved to the Calisthenium and Riding Academy (later Avery Hall) and the rebranding to the Vassar College Museum of Natural History. The Riding Academy would be renamed to the Museum. At this time, the collections expanded beyond geology to include zoological and anatomical specimens.

Upon Orton's death, William Buck Dwight became the college's new Professor of Natural History. Dwight's major project was to acquire a mastodon skeleton for the Museum. Dwight assembled one using the bones of many individuals from across the nation, and the Vassar Mastodon became one of the centerpieces of the collection. It measured 9 feet tall and 20 feet long, larger than most mastodons.

The Vassar Mastodon on the third floor of New England.

Move to New England

In 1918, the Museum moved again, this time to New England Building. The second floor was taken up by the collection of 3,000 taxidermy birds, including over half of all those in North America. The landing between the first and second floors had embryological models from a wide variety of animals. The majority of exhibits were on the third floor, including specimens in cases and the skeletons and taxidermies. Skeletons included a Mastodon, horse, cow, pig and deer, and taxidermies included a sea turtle, walrus, a famous game fish, the tarpon (which was an impressive 6 feet, 6 inches long and weighed about 187 pounds), and the American Bison. There were also models of extinct elephant relatives and a saber-toothed tiger, as well as displays of insects and parisites. At this time, all Poughkeepsie children came on field trips to the museum.

Over time, the museum fell into disrepair. In the 1970s the Walrus, Buffalo and other specimens needed to be disposed of due to infestations. An employee stole these from the dumpster, but the walrus tusks were returned in 2006.

In 1973, with the creation of Olmsted Hall, the Plant Sciences, Zoology and Anatomy departments were consolidated into one singular Biology Department. With their move to Olmsted, New England third floor was turned over to studio art. In 1979 the decision was made to close the museum, and Professor Margaret Wright was tasked with finding new homes for the collections. Pieces of the museum were send to Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., the Museum of Natural History in New York City, the State Museum at Albany, the Trailside Museum in Westchester County, Dutchess Community College and the Audubon Society. Some of the birds were moved to Olmsted Hall, where they remain to this day.

In 1986, the Mastodon skeleton was believed to be a plaster cast and was scheduled to be disposed of. An art professor contacted the Museum of Natural History in Manhattan and confirmed that it was in fact real. The skeleton was transferred to SUNY New Paltz, where it sat unassembled in storage until at least 2005.

A. Scott Warthin Museum of Geology and Natural History

The little remained of the museum was moved to Ely Hall in 1992, and in 2006 it was renamed the A. Scott Warthin Museum of Geology and Natural History. The Earth Science department maintains these collections.