Excerpt from Forty-Sixth Annual Report: For the Year 1941
It is paradoxical, in these times, but the hard statistical fact is that both the Mammal and the Bird Departments came out of the year 1941 with extraordinarily fine collections - both departments with more speci mens than the year before, the Bird Department with an increase in species and the Mammal Department with a species record that has been exceeded only twice in the history of the Zoological Park!
War years make Cassandras out of the most optimistic curators of zoological collections and there was much moaning and groaning among our staff until the end-of-the-year census revealed the true state of affairs. Despite blockades and sinkings, closing of ports and the shrinkage of cargo space, animal collections did somehow continue to arrive from the far corners of the world, generous friends continued to make gifts of animals, and the reproductive instinct flourished.
The whole world, of course, was not at war until near the end of the year, and there is no doubt that the prospect for 1942 is not, at the moment, too bright. But that is another story - and another Annual Report.
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