Manhattan's ingenious American Museum of Natural History last week got ready to exhibit the newest trick in museum educational work. Back of a picket fence the visitor sees a stuffed hen looking at a painting of other hens and a rooster in a barnyard (see cut). As the visitor looks a loudspeaker narrates: "The hens in the barnyard seem to us all very much alike. We would have great difficulty in distinguishing one from another if we did not put rings or other identification marks on their legs. But to the hen every other hen in the yard is a personality."
At that instant a stage trick of lighting makes the background fade out, and a scene of a barnyard as a hen sees it comes into the visitor's view. The rooster is enormous (see cut). The loudspeaker continues: ". . . for there is a social system in the barnyard. One hen ... can peck another hen . . . without being pecked back, and a third hen can peck still a fourth . . . without fear of retaliation. The rooster stands at the head of this social system, but beneath him,' in a definite social order, are arranged the various hens. This social system does not owe its existence merely to strength. Bluff or circumstances frequently enter into the establishing of an order. If two hens, strangers to one another, should meet, the first one to be frightened becomes subordinate to the other in the social system. . . .
"A hen high in the social system does not ordinarily peck those low in the system. The others give way to her whenever she appears. On the other hand, the hen low in the system may be very cruel toward its subordinates.
"The social system plays an important part in the life of the hens. Those low in the system secure less food and are unable to keep themselves as neat as the hens near the top of the order. A sick bird drops to the. bottom of the social system because there is little sympathy among hens or possibly because the other hens fail to recognize the sick individual as one of their group.
"Hens may keep their position in the pecking order throughout life. They remember other individuals in their set after isolation of half a year. Among birds, only parrots are superior to hens in the length of time they can remember faces. Pecking orders are found in many groups of animals but are often modified by other social factors."
WPA workers assigned to the museum by the Government built the barnyard exhibit and are at work on five others which show how different creatures see the world. To a dog all things are grey, because dogs are colorblind. Fish are nearsighted and the refraction of water distorts the feet of a fisherman standing on a bank. The mosaic structure of a fly's eye gives him a multitude of images. A turtle's world is a shifting scene of bright spots because light Attracts its eyes. A huge chameleon will turn the color of the clothes of the person who may stand before the photocell which constitutes its "eye."
Director Roy Chapman Andrews of the American Museum will open these displays on June 8. On that day, far out over the Pacific, the moon will eclipse the sun for the longest period (7 min. 4 sec.) in 1,200 years. It is also the second Tuesday in June, the most popular day in the year for committing suicide.