California Academy of Sciences - History

History

The California Academy of Natural Sciences was founded in 1853, only three years after California joined the United States, becoming the first society of its kind in the Western U.S. Its stated aim was to undertake "a thorough systematic survey of every portion of the State and the collection of a cabinet of her rare and rich productions". It was renamed as the more inclusive California Academy of Sciences in 1868.

The academy had a forward-thinking approach to the involvement of women in science, passing a resolution in its first year of existence that the members "highly approve of the aid of females in every department of natural science, and invite their cooperation". This policy led to several women being hired into professional positions as botanists, entomologists, and other occupations during the 19th century, when opportunities for women in the sciences were limited, and often, those that existed were restricted to menial cataloging and calculation work.

The academy's first official museum opened in 1874 at the corner of California and Dupont Streets (now Grant Avenue) in what now is Chinatown, and drew up to 80,000 visitors a year. To accommodate its increasing popularity, the academy moved to a new and larger building on Market Street in 1891, funded by the legacy of James Lick, a 19th century San Francisco real estate mogul, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. Only fifteen years later, however, the Market Street facility fell victim to the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, which also wiped out large swathes of the academy's library and specimen collections. In the widespread destruction occurring in the aftermath of the quake, academy curators and staffers only were able to retrieve a single cart of materials, including academy minute books, membership records, and 2,000 type specimens. Fortunately, an expedition to the Galápagos Islands (the first of several sponsored by the academy) already was underway, and it returned seven months later, instantly providing replacement collections for those lost.

It was not until 1916 that the Academy moved to the North American Hall of Birds and Mammals in Golden Gate Park, the first building on the site that was to become its permanent home. In 1923, the Steinhart Aquarium was added, followed in 1934 by the Simson African Hall.

During World War II, the academy contributed to the American war effort by using its workshop facilities to repair optical and navigational equipment for United States Navy ships; San Francisco was a major port for the Pacific War arena.

The post-war years saw a flurry of new construction on the site; the Science Hall was added in 1951, followed by the Morrison Planetarium in 1952. The Morrison Planetarium was the seventh major planetarium to open in the United States and featured a one-of-a-kind star projector, built by academy staff members (in part using the expertise gained doing the optical work for the U.S. Navy during World War II).

The Academy Projector produced a remarkably natural-looking star field. It projected irregularly shaped stars, rather than the circular stars projected by many optical star projectors. The irregular shapes were created by placing variously sized grains of silicon carbide onto the glass star plates by hand, then aluminizing the plates, and brushing away the silicon carbide grains.

In 1959, the Malliard Library, Eastwood Hall of Botany, and Livermore Room all were added. Throughout the 1960s, universities concentrating on the new field of molecular biology divested themselves of their specimen collections, entrusting them to the academy and leading to a rapid growth of the academy's holdings.

In 1969, another new building, Cowell Hall, was added to the site. In 1976, several new galleries were opened, and the following year, in 1977, the "fish roundabout" was constructed.

In 1985, Howard the Duck was filmed using the museum; the exhibition of Jim Gary's Twentieth Century Dinosaurs was featured prominently in the movie.

Prior to the old building being torn down in 2005, there was a Life through Time gallery, housing a large display on evolution and paleontology. There was a Gem & Mineral Hall, a section on Earthquakes, and a Gary Larson exhibit.