Hartford-Smithsonian West Indies Expedition (1937)

The Hartford-Smithsonian West Indies Expedition of 1937 traveled over 4,500 miles in two months, making 19 stops on 15 islands. Their journey began at Nassau in the Bahamas on March 15, and during the next 2 months traveled south as far as Barbados. The group also visited the Bahamas, Cuba, Puerto Rico, St. Croix, Haiti, Tortuga, St. Thomas, St. John, Barbados, Jamaica, and the Dominican Republic among many others, with the trip finally coming to an end on May 12. Mr. George Huntington Hartford invited Dr. Waldo Schmitt, Curator of the Division of Marine Invertebrates at the U.S. National Museum, to lead the expedition upon his old fashioned full-rigged ship, the Joseph Conrad. The other member of the trip’s scientific team was G. Robert Lunz, from the Charleston Museum in South Carolina. The expedition was focused primarily with marine material, mainly invertebrates, but also algae and two adult porpoises were collected. In total, more than 4,000 specimens of marine invertebrates were secured, chiefly Crustacea but sponges, coelenterates, and annelids as well. Fish, mollusks, a few fossils, and minerals were also obtained along with a wide and interesting assortment of Echinoderms, including three new species of ophiurans.