CHAPTER I
Man and Mollusks
Seashells and man were closely associated even before the dawn of civilization when primitive man gathered snails, oysters, and other kinds of mollusks along the seashore for food, implements, ornaments, and money. The many kitchen-middens and burial sites in nearly every corner of the world reveal the great extent to which early peoples were dependent upon mollusks. On some coral islands, as, for instance, Barbados, where there was no available stone, nearly all domestic utensils, including knives and axes, were made from seashells. As civilization became more complex, specialization in the use of mollusks increased. From them were obtained dyes, inks, textiles and windowpanes. In the Mediterranean region there was a long period when an entire commercial empire owed its origin and continued success to the Tyrian purple obtained from a seashell. Later, in Roman times, the farming of oysters and edible snails became a major enterprise.
Today the uses of molluscan shells are legion. Jewelers, artists and button manufacturers; biologists, geologists and archaeologists; bird and aquarium dealers; all daily use mollusks or their products. In recent years there has flourished in Florida a five-million-dollar-a-year seashell industry. Throughout the country, the hobby of shell collecting is enjoyed by countless thousands, and it now rivals the popularity of coin collecting. Local and federal agencies are investing millions in research directed toward the more efficient cultivation and utilization of commercially important mollusks.
From another standpoint of perhaps even greater importance mollusks have influenced the activities and welfare of man. Some are extremely destructive to wooden structures in the sea, and others are a serious menace to health, mostly as intermediate hosts to dangerous parasites or as carriers of
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