When most U.S. nationals in the early republic thought of the Pacific Ocean, they conjured lands instead: the tens of thousands of islands that comprise Oceania and that Epeli Hau’ofa once famously called “Our Sea of Islands.” Writing in the 1830s, for instance, the writer and explorer Jeremiah Reynolds extolled the “vast expanse of the two Pacifics, with their countless summer isles.” The emphasis on islands reflected a combination of hard commercial interests in the South Pacific—especially the whaling, sea cucumber, and sandalwood industries—as well as cultural fascinations with tropical climates and Oceanian societies. Indeed, antebellum citizens were captivated with the apparent incongruity between “the tempting Edens of the South Pacific” and the supposed “cannibal banquets” of those who dwelled in them.
The collections of the National Gallery both reflected and reinforced these popular notions of a Pacific World centered on Oceanian societies. Located on the cavernous second floor, or “Great Hall,” of the U.S. Patent Office in Washington, DC, the National Gallery was the first publicly funded national museum of natural history in the United States. It showcased a wide array of specimens acquired by the War and Treasury Departments, U.S. diplomats, the National Institute for the Promotion of Science, and especially the United States Exploring Expedition.
Circumnavigating the globe between 1838 and 1842, the “Ex Ex” (as contemporaries referred to it), charted, surveyed, negotiated with (and sometimes massacred) Oceanian peoples, and collected specimens and artifacts from across the South Pacific and Northwest coast of North America. Over the course of four years, it directed homeward a torrent of plants, insects, crustaceans, mollusks, corals, fish, reptiles, birds, mammals, and human remains and artifacts. Indeed, one scholar concluded that the Ex Ex’s anthropological collection was “the largest ever made by a single sailing expedition.”
The sheer size of the Ex Ex collection made it the largest single source for specimens in the National Gallery. In total, the Ex Ex provided the contents of at least one out of every three display cases in the National Gallery. No wonder, then, that in 1843 Congress appointed the irascible commander of the Ex Ex, Charles Wilkes, to oversee the collections. Wilkes moved quickly to ensure that his expedition’s materials achieved maximum credit; he arranged the museum so that its first eight cases were filled with Ex Ex artifacts from the South Pacific and mounted a handsome sign over the Gallery’s entrance with the words “‘Collection of the Exploring Expedition’. . . in large Golden letters.” His actions ensured that the National Gallery would become a prominent source of public information about the Pacific world.