Prof. Otis Tufton Mason
Smithsonian ethnologist · 1838–1908
American ethnologist and curator at the Smithsonian Institution, best known for his work on the classification of material culture and on basketry. His connection to Ocean City is a private tragedy: his son George E. Mason, born 1866, drowned near Ocean City, Maryland on Tuesday, August 5, 1879, and was buried from his aunts' house on Patrick Street in Alexandria, Virginia, two days later. Mason's wife was a daughter of the late John E. Henderson of Alexandria.
In the record (1)
1879 · 1879-08-05
August 5, 1879: George Mason, thirteen-year-old son of the Smithsonian ethnologist Otis Tufton Mason, drowns near Ocean City — the season's second fatal bathing accident in sixteen days.
The Washington Evening Star of August 7 reported that "the remains of master George Mason, son of Prof. O. T. Mason, who was drowned near Ocean City, Md., Tuesday, as stated in yesterday's Star, were brought to Alexandria last evening for burial." The following day's paper recorded the funeral, from the residence of the boy's aunts on Patrick Street, Alexandria. His mother was a daughter of the late John E. Henderson of that city. Otis Tufton Mason was then curator of ethnology at the Smithsonian Institution; his son George E. Mason was born in 1866. Coming sixteen days after Budd Ford drowned in front of the Atlantic Hotel, the death made 1879 the first Ocean City season with a documented drowning toll.
Source · checked 2026-08-06