In my March 7, 2014 blog posting I mentioned that my research had revealed various reports dating from 1875 to 1896 stating that the Museum of the Survey, first in Montreal and later in Ottawa, had in its collection Logan’s specimens of Protichnites from Beauharnois. When I wrote my March 7, 2014 posting one thing I did not include was my suspicion that the slabs had been misplaced when Canada’s Parliament Buildings burned down in February, 1916 and Parliament was moved to the Victoria Memorial Museum, displacing the Geological Survey of Canada from the building.
Since then I have located Harlan Smith’s (1916) report of the fire and the haste with which the exhibits of the Museum of the Geological Survey and staff were moved from the Victoria Museum to make way for the museum to be used as a temporary home for Parliament. In 1911 Harlan Smith joined the Geological Survey of Canada as head of its archeology division and would have personally taken part in the crating of specimens.
The fire that destroyed the Parliament Buildings started about 9 p.m. , Thursday, February 3, 1916 . Before the fire started the Geological Survey had occupied practically all of the Victoria Memorial Museum building. Harlan Smith notes that “About ten a.m. [on Friday] February 4th, the morning after the fire, the Survey staff was informed of the intended use of the building as a temporary home for the Dominion Parliament.” Many museum exhibits were crated and moved, and put into storage, some before the end of the day on Friday. Here is Harlan Smith’s account of the packing of the minerals, geological specimens, invertebrate palaeontological exhibits and vertebrate palaeontological exhibits:
“The west hall was occupied by the tentative exhibit of minerals. This exhibit was packed and removed in six hours, or by 4 p.m., Friday, which was less than twenty hours after the fire began. The costly cases in which these minerals were exhibited had meanwhile been taken apart and placed in storage. Rooms for the members of the Senate were made here.
The west wing, which was being prepared for geological and mineralogical exhibits, was cleared before Monday noon. The Senate met at 8 p.m. on Tuesday in this new chamber, which had been vacated by the museum within seventy-five hours after it became known that the Senate would meet in the museum.
The east hall, with invertebrate palaeontological exhibits, similar in size to the other exhibition halls, contained thousands of small and delicate specimens. These were all carefully wrapped, packed and taken away. Forty hours after the beginning of the fire, all the museum specimens and cases had been moved from this part of the building, which was made into offices for the members of the House of Commons.
Of the east wing, containing tentative vertebrate palaeontological exhibits, three-quarters were cleared, and these exhibits were stored, with those of the' other quarters, along the walls of the southern half of the hall. This clearing involved not only the moving of small exhibits in cases, but also of such heavy fragile specimens as the titanotherium and the skulls of dinosaurs and mammoths, yet it was all done within two hours after this notification, that is by noon, or in less than twenty hours from the time that the fire broke out.”
Is it any wonder that some specimens were misplaced?
+++++++++
Where is the Holotype of Aspidella?
Elkanah Billings, Paleontologist to the Geological Survey of Canada, originally briefly described and figured Aspidella in 1872. His drawing shows a small slab with two elliptical discs. Unfortunately that slab is missing. Below I mention that Hoffman (1970) states that the slab is missing, and that Gehling, Narbonne, and Anderson (2000) confirm that it was still missing. However I also mention that Dr. Alice E. Wilson (1957) states that she can remember Billings’s specimens in the Museum of the Geological Survey, that after the burning of the Parliament Buildings the exhibits were packed and stored, and that in 1957 “Aspidella terranovica is still in storage.”
H. J. Hoffman, 1970 – the Holotype of Aspidella is missing
I expect that everyone in Canada with an interest in Ediacaran and other Precambrian fossils has at one time picked up H. J. Hoffman’s (1970) book entitled “Precambrian Fossils, Pseudofossils, and Problematica in Canada.” Somewhat surprisingly (as I was more interested in minerals than fossils), I’ve been aware of the publication since shortly after it was first published. I had a friend in university in biology who told me in the fall of ‘72 or ‘73 that he was writing a paper on the origin of life, and I was able to direct him to Hoffman’s publication, and to take him over to the Geology Department’s library and show him the text.
Hoffman (1970) mentions that “The holotype slab (GSC type 221) is missing from the collections of the Geological Survey of Canada, but a platotype (cast?) (Pl. 5, fig. 1) of the holotype is fortunately available for study (GSC type 221c). This metal plastotype slab bears the outline of two parallel-oriented elliptical specimens of Aspidella terranovica. ... Two other specimens ... labelled Aspidella terranovica, are in the same collection as the platotype. Specimen 221a (Pl. 5, fig 2) is from Ferryland... Specimen 221b (Pl. 5, fig 3) is from
St. John’s.
Gehling, Narbonne, and Anderson, 2000 - Still Missing
Gehling, Narbonne, and Anderson (2000) state that “Billings (1872) originally named Aspidella from a small slab bearing two raised oval-shaped discs, without identifying one specimen as the holotype. On the metal platotype, which is all that remains of the original slab, a small cross adjacent to the largest specimen may be interpreted as indicating the intended holotype (GSC type 221c). Walcott (1899, pl. 27, figs 7-8, 14-15) illustrated two other specimens in the type collection under the same name and number, from the same locality (... GSC 221a-221b).
Alice E. Wilson, 1957 – Billing’s Specimens of Aspidella are in Storage
Dr. Alice E. Wilson provides hope that the holotype slab can be found. In a paper entitled ‘Life in the Proterozoic’, which was a Chapter in a book entitled ‘The Proterozoic in Canada,” she discusses Aspidella and commented:
“Billings (1873, 1874) described and illustrated by drawings (not photographs) some forms from the “Huronian” near St. John’s, Newfoundland. He named them Aspidella terranovica. The writer remembers these specimens in the Museum of the Geological Survey. After the burning of the Parliament Buildings, when Parliament was moved to the Museum Building, the exhibits were packed and stored. Aspidella terranovica is still in storage. No tests were ever made upon the specimens.”
I believe that Dr. Alice E. Wilson can be relied on when she says that the specimens of Aspidclla were packed and put in storage in 1916, and were still in storage in 1957 . She worked for the Geological Survey of Canada from 1909, starting in the Museum, until her forced retirement at age 65 in 1946. She maintained an office at the Survey – and kept publishing articles on paleontology – until shortly before her death in 1964. She would have been involved in the crating and storage of the specimens.
The issue is then: Where are they stored? The first place that I will start looking is at the Canadian Museum of Nature’s Research Facility in Gatineau, Quebec where Logan’s specimens of Protichnites were located. Hence the cryptic title to this blog posting.
Located
Addendum (April 1 & 2): In answer to my email I received back an email with a photo of GSC221, the holotype of Aspidella. Interestingly the slab is larger than I expected and shows at least six elliptical discs. However, it is at the GSC’s offices at 601 Booth Street in Ottawa, and not at Canadian Museum of Nature’s Research and Collections Facility on Pink Road in Gatineau, Quebec. It was found a year or so ago. I have booked an appointment to attend and photograph the holotype specimen and will put the photographs that I take on my blog..
Christopher Brett
Ottawa, Ontario
References and Suggested Reading
Billings, E., 1872
On some fossils from the primordial rocks of Newfoundland. Canadian Naturalist and Quarterly Journal of Science. Volume 6, New Series, pages 465- 479 at pages 478-79.
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/32756#page/497/mode/1up
MacNaughton, R. W., Brett, C. P., Coyne, M. And Shepherd, K., 2017
Sir William Logan and the Adventure of the Ancient Amphibious Arthropod.
Abstract with Program, Canadian Paleontological Conference, Calgary, Alberta
David, T. W. E., 1928
Notes on newly discovered fossils in the Adelaide series (Lipalian?), South Australia, Trans. Roy. Soc. S. Australia, vol. 52, pp 191-209, plates 13-18
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/129838#page/197/mode/1up
Gehling, J.G., Narbonne, G.M. and Anderson, M.M., 2000:
The first named Ediacaran body fossil, Aspidella terranovica . Palaeontology, Volume 43, pages 427-456. DOI: 10.1111/j.0031-0239.2000.00134.x
Hoffman, H. J. (1970)
Precambrian Fossils, Pseudofossils, and Problematica in Canada. Geological Survey of Canada, Bulletin 189, 146 pages, 25plates, map, charts. Aspidella at pages 14-17 and plate 5;
https://doi.org/10.4095/123948
Smith, Harlan, 1916
The Fire and the Museum at Ottawa. The Ottawa Naturalist, March, 1916, pages 164-167
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/28021#page/172/mode/1up
Sprigg, R.C., 1947
Early Cambrian (?) jellyfishes from the Flinders Ranges, South Australia.
- Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia, vol. 71, 212-224
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/128949#page/235/mode/1up
Sprigg, R. C., 1950 [Read 8 September 1949]
Early Cambrian 'Jellyfishes' of Ediacara South Australia and Mount John, Kimberley District, Western Australia. Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia, 73-99, plates
https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/41362240#page/96/mode/1up
Wade, Arthur, 1923-24
Petroleum Prospect. Kimberley District of Western Australia and Northern Territory. By Federal Authority. Melbourne. 1923-24, pages 30, 34, 36 and 37. Plates vii-xii.
p. 30: "Our most interesting find consisted of a variety of fossil remains in these (Mount John.— T. W. E. D.) siliceous flags and shales. These consisted of the tracks of forms of life unknown to us — Worm tracks, long stem-like structures sometimes in great profusion, and other more complex and more obscure forms." Quoted in David, 1928
Wilson, Alice E, 1957
Life in the Proterozoic, a Chapter in The Proterozoic in Canada, James E. Gill, editor, University of Toronto Press, 204 pages at pages 18-27
https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3138/j.ctt1vgw7jv
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