International Exchange Service Funding

Object Details

Category: Chronology of Smithsonian History
Notes: Oehser, Paul H. The Smithsonian Institution. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1970, p. 158-59; Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution for the year 1881, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1883, p. 808.; Rhees, William Jones. The Smithsonian Institution: Documents Relative to Its Origin and History: 1835-1899, Vol. 1, 1835-1887. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1901, p. 896-901.
Summary: In recognition of the growing cost of the International Exchange Service, Secretary Spencer F. Baird asks the Secretary of State to request a $7,000 Congressional appropriation. After an international conference on exchanges, held in Paris in 1875, the State Department had requested that the Smithsonian Institution carry into effect the proposed system. It was assumed that little additional outlay would be required to mesh the proposed international system with the established Smithsonian exchange system, but after a two year trial, this had not turned out to be the case. On March 3, 1881, Congress will respond by providing the first federal funds for this purpose via a $3,000 appropriation to the Interior Department for administration of the publications International Exchange Service performed by the Smithsonian.
Contact information: Institutional History Division, Smithsonian Institution Archives, 600 Maryland Avenue, S.W., Washington, D.C. 20024-2520, SIHistory@si.edu

Subject: Baird, Spencer Fullerton 1823-1887; International Exchange Service (IES); United States Dept. of State; United States Congress; United States Dept. of the Interior

Topic: Exchanges, Literary and scientific; Expenditures, Public; Interagency Relations; Museum publications; Secretaries