An earlier voyage was the "Blake Expeditions" 1877-1878.  We owe much of the
William Healy Dall's work for the East Coast of the US to these voyages.
The major publications on it were through the Bulletin of the Museum of
Comparative Zoology Harvard (HMCZ)
   *   Dall, W.H. 1885-1886,  Vol. XII,  Report on the Mollusca, Part I
Bivalvia,
   *   Dall, W.H. June 1889,  Vol. XVIII ,  XXIX - Report on the Mollusca,
Part II Gastropoda & Scaphopoda,
These are amongst my most treasured and favorite publications!

The "Oregon" surveyed from 1950 to 1955 in the Gulf of Mexico.  The only
publication I know of from it is a statistical analysis book with data but
no new species etc.
   *   Springer & Bullis 1956 -  Collections by the Oregon in the Gulf of
Mexico,  US Department of the Interior, Fish & Wildlife Service, Special
Scientific Report: Fisheries No. 196

The "Albatross" was in the Pacific.  Dall and Bartch both published a great
deal from those cruises.
I believe most of the publications came out of the Smithsonian.

In the 1970's' and 80's ? the State of Florida conducted the Hourglass
Cruises in the Gulf of Mexico and published "Memoirs of the Hourglass
Cruses"
The series lost funding and has never been completed, i.e. - the mollusca
portion and more specifically Dr. James E. Quinn's publication on the
Trochidae (Calliostoma) He published almost the equivalent of it in "The
Nautilus"  a few years back.

Leslie Allen Crnkovic
HARF/IMCS


-----Original Message-----
From: Conchologists of America List [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Ross Mayhew
Sent: 12 August, 2000 6:33 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Great Voyages of Discovery

In the 1890s, there was an extremely successful 2-year, rond-the-world
journey
of a ship that made trawls and took planktonic samples in every sea - an
excellent sampling of the marine biodiversity of the planet.  I don't recall
the
name of the vessal - was it the Darwin?

I would like to find out a bit about similar great voyages of discovery
which
have been made in this century: i am aware of several research efforts on a
much
more limited scale, but was there ever again a similar, grand
round-the-world
marine exploration expedition, with its main focus being on benthic
orgainisms?
What about protracted, intensive, yet more regional efforts?  I was certain
there was such a one in the Indonesian region a couple of years ago, but
cannot
now find any information regarding this.   Also, what about the Carribean?

This IS mollusc-related, since these voyages always yield large numbers of
new
mollusc species, reminding us just how slender our knowledge of the ocean's
floor truly is, and how rich the biodiversity of even the deepest parts of
the
seabottom.  Let's see if we can come with a good list, like we did with the
topic "conchological couples"! Has anyone written a book on the topic, or
made a
decent catalogue of such efforts?

-Ross.