If you are not familiar with the Davenport Academy of Natural Sciences, it rivaled, and even excelled, the Smithsonian collection at the turn of the 20th century.  It was one of the many amateur Academies set up to study our world and its history.  Of course, my main area of interest is the work they did on the Archaeology of the America's.

In the forefront were questions of  the origins of the Mound Builders and whether primitive man inhabited America before, or during, the last Ice Age.  Remember that this was before the discoveries of  chipped stone artifacts, undeniably made by humans, in direct context with Ice Age mammals during the first quarter of the twentieth century.  Many amateurs of the 19th Century shared the belief that man was here at that time and a few were a little too anxious to turn this theory into accepted fact.

No matter what eventually transpired from the actions of a few misguided members, the Academy saved many artifacts in their collection and recorded details of mound excavations that would have been lost forever.  Many of these mounds now have houses, roads or factories over them.  We definitely owe them a debt of gratitude for this. 

So, if you get a chance, please come to Davenport's Putnam Museum (the direct descendent of the Davenport Academy) and see what the fuss was all about, and then take a look at the many wonderful artifacts that were preserved for posterity by these archaeological pioneers.   The Putnam Museum certainly deserves kudos for keeping the Academy's collection intact.