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Without objection, the Board voted to take no action in this matter at the present time, and the Secretary was instructed to inform Mr. Noon, Manager of the Los Angeles Branch of the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco, of this decision.

THE LEWIS COLLECTION OF WASHINGTON RELICS
The Secretary presented a memorandum addressed to the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution from Mrs. Thomas I. H. Powel, Regent of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association which requests that the Lewis Collection of relics of George Washington, now in the Department of History, U.S. National Museum, be placed on indefinite loan at Mount Vernon.
The highly valued collection includes a variety of interesting objects--small articles of furniture, dishes, portraits, engravings and related memorabilia--that came to Mrs. George Lewis, the former Nelly Custis, on the the death of Mrs. Martha Washington in 1802. In 1878 the heirs of Mrs. Lewis offered them to the United States Government, as they foresaw that with the passage of years and the separation of the family, the articles would be scattered, whereas it was felt that such valuable relics should be public property, placed where they would be accessible to all. The collection was purchased by act of Congress for $12,000, and placed in the U.S. Patent Office, where other historical collections were at this time assembled. In 1883 the Lewis Collection and other similar materials were transferred to the U.S. National Museum, where the Washington relics have been on continuous exhibition to date.
The Mount Vernon Ladies' Association in recent years has made a number of requests to the U.S. National Museum and the Smithsonian Institution for transfer of this material, which have been refused.