A lot of our equipment has come to us through the decades by chance or good fortune. In 1983 the Herpetology and other sections of the National Museum shared the 1501 Carling Avenue Beamish Building in Ottawa, (which had been the warehouse of the failing chain of Beamish Stores) with some general storage warehousing.
An old Jewish janitor, with the thriftiness traditionally ascribed to his ethnicity, was reluctant to follow orders to pitch boxes of popcorn bags from a failed "Canadian Heritage Food" enterprise (which had evidently splurged too much of its startup capital on these wonderful bags) into the dumpster, and repeatedly urged the museum staff to make use of them. The late Mike Rankin (as thrifty as a Scottish background is supposed to make one) accepted several of these boxes, and dispersed them among Herpetology, Ichthyology, and us. We have since then inherited the museum's stock of popcorn bags.
