Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/479

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In Memoriam : Frank Hamilton Cushing. 1 3 1

Mary Hemenway, of Boston, the " Hemenway Archaeological Expe- dition," and as its director the next year " discovered and excavated extensive buried cities in Arizona and New Mexico." During the progress of these researches Mr. Cushing was taken sick, which interfered with his personal labors in the investigation. An account of the aims, objects, etc., of this expedition was communicated by him to the Congres International des Amdricanistes in 1888. From this time until his death, except when ill health prevented it, he was engaged in the arrangement and publication of portions of the vast amount of information accumulated by him during his stay among the Zunis, and the corroboration of it by further studies and inves- tigations, the years 1 891- 1897 being fertile in more or less extended essays on all sides of Indian life and beliefs. In the midst of his devotion to ethnology, mythology, and folk-lore Cushing never for- got his early love for archaeology, as his studies of " Primitive Cop- per-Working " (1893), "Shoreland Pottery" (1894), the "Arrow" (1895), "Implement Making" (1897), etc., prove. In 1895 he was at the head of the Pepper-Hurst expedition in Florida, and discov- ered on the Gulf Coast of that State extensive remains of a sea- dwelling people. Mr. Cushing was one of the original members of the American Folk-Lore Society, and served as one of its first assist- ant secretaries in 1888. In 1894 he was elected vice-president of Section H (Anthropology), and at the Springfield meeting the fol- lowing year delivered his noteworthy address on the " Arrow." He was an active member of the Anthropological Society of Washington, D. C, and in 1895 was vice-president (Section D, Technology). Mr. Cushing married, July 10, 1882, Miss Emily Tennison McGill, of Washington, D. C.

In Mr. Cushing anthropological science in America loses one of its most remarkable figures. A tireless investigator, a " brother " of the Indian, an eloquent talker, and a charming writer, he had a personality entirely sui generis. Add to his make-up absolute health, and we have an ideal student of uncivilized man ! The present writer, whose acquaintance with Mr. Cushing was not intimate but, in the brief periods of meeting, most helpful and inspiring, will long treasure the remembrance of an hour's talk now and then with him on the "deep things" of the life of the barbarian and the savage. Both in private and in public he was one who impressed his audience as a man having " authority " to speak whereof he might. As his essays, from time to time, revealed, he had much of the poet in him and the deep eloquence of faith. It is difficult to compare him with his peers and fellow-laborers in anthropological science. In a sense, he stands apart and alone. He must be judged by his works and his life.

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