Medical Museum is rapidly becoming nothing but a storehouse of poorly arranged and poorly exhibited pathological specimens * * *. Also the Museum's files and records are six months from being up to date."
The situation of Mr. Reeve, chief photographer and the only civilian employee in the department, was singled out. "If anything should happen to him," the memorandum read, "the department would collapse." 5[1]
More restrained in their language, but much the same in import, were the Annual Reports of The Surgeon General of the Army for this period in the life of the Museum.
"The continued increase in routine pathological and administrative details has again prevented renovation of the museum exhibits which has been needed badly for a number of years," said Surgeon General Robert Urie Patterson in his annual report for 1934. "The changes made in the main museum in 1933 have but accentuated the need for further work of this type * * *. An attempt to reduce and prevent overcrowding is continually being made but the present quarters necessitate removal of some portion of present exhibits when anything new is added." Personnel was not adequate, The Surgeon General said, to permit the making of the studies which should be made.6[2]
In 1935, when the Museum was visited by 81,423 persons, the largest number which had done so in any year up to that time, Surgeon General Charles R. Reynolds spoke again of the great need for revision of the general museum, but said that because of insufficient personnel it could not be done.7[3]
The subject was discussed more at length in General Reynolds' report for 1936. "The routine pathology," he said, "is more than sufficient to fully occupy all of the [time of the] officers regularly assigned to duty. However, in addition to the purely professional work, a large amount of time is required for the administration of the museum, the proper conduct of the registries and in teaching the course in pathology at the Army Medical School. All of the officers are required to spend additional hours of duty in the institution and to take part of the routine work to their homes to be done during the evenings and on Saturday afternoons and Sundays. As a consequence, very little time can be spent in the proper care and display of the permanent Museum exhibit."
Revision of the "entire exhibit on a modern basis" was "sorely needed," The Surgeon General said, but shortage of trained technical personnel precluded such a possibility.
