| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| June 1, 1979 | "Sesame Street" moves to the National Museum of History and Technology, now the National Museum of American History, in the form of "Ten Years of Sesame Street," an exhibit on display in the Division of Community Life through Labor Day, 1979. |
| June 2, 1858 | United States Congress appropriates $4,000 for preservation of the collections of government exploring and surveying expeditions, and an additional $1,000 for the transfer and new arrangement of the collections. These new collections represent about one-fifth of the Institution's collection. Under this arrangement, the Smithsonian will become curator of the national collections and Congress will continue the annual appropriation of about $4,000 for the care and exhibition of the collection. The annual appropriation is under the charge of the Secretary of the Interior, relieving the Institution of the necessity of making annual application to Congress. The actual work of transferring the collections was completed in July 1858. |
| June 2, 1980 | The National Air and Space Museum's (NASM) Silver Hill Facility is renamed the Paul E. Garber Facility in honor of NASM's Historian Emeritus. Mr. Garber had joined the Smithsonian in 1920 and was responsible for acquiring a large portion of its aeronautical collection. |
| June 3, 1966 |  A new Smithsonian seal is approved, in the form of the sun with
alternating straight and wavy rays representing heat and light -- "The Sun in His
Splendor." It bears the inscription: "Smithsonian Institution, Washington,
D.C." The seal was designed at the request of Secretary S. Dillon Ripley to coincide
with the bicentennial of James Smithson's birth. |
| June 4, 1985 | At the National Museum of Natural History, "Aditi: A Celebration of Life," created in New Delhi in 1978 to mark the International Year of the Child, opens. It is one of the major Smithsonian contributions to the nationwide Festival of India. It will become one of the most popular exhibits ever held in that museum. India is also featured at the Festival of American Folklife. |
| June 4, 1987 | "Dinosaurs, Past and Present" opens at the National Museum of Natural History, "the largest and most comprehensive exhibit of dinosaur art ever assembled." The exhibit runs until August 31. |
| June 5, 1838 |  The James Smithson bequest, having been awarded to the United States by
the English Court of Chancery, is transferred to the U.S. agent Richard Rush. Rush sells
the bonds and securities from Smithson's estate, converts them into gold sovereigns, and,
on July 17, departs for the United States. At the United States Mint in Philadelphia, the
gold is recoined into American money, amounting to $508,318.46. Two of the original
English sovereigns are now held by the National Numismatic Collection, National Museum of
American History. |
| June 5, 1981 |  "George Catlin: The Artist and the American Indian" opens at
National Museum of American Art and runs through September 13. The exhibit includes the
104 paintings from the Museum's collection. President Ronald Reagan visits the exhibit. |
| June 6, 1967 | Two halls of the "Growth of the United States" exhibit in the National Museum of History and Technology, now the National Museum of American History, open to the public. The halls cover the period 1640-1851, and contain many objects of particular interest representing the arts, technology, and science. Included are a printing press used by Benjamin Franklin, the wheels and gears from a 1774 grist mill from Chester County, Pennsylvania, and a house frame from Ipswich, Massachusetts, dating from the 1690s and 1750s. |
| June 7, 1936 | The first "The World Is Yours" radio program is aired over the National Broadcasting Company network. A joint project of the Smithsonian Institution, U.S. Department of the Interior Office of Education, and Works Progress Administration, the half-hour programs air once a week on topics ranging from mammals to insects to geology to ethnology to art history to aeronautics, etc. Scripts are prepared by Smithsonian staff and presentations are done by out-of-work actors and musicians. The program is suspended in May of 1942 because of the war effort. |
| June 8, 1984 | "Erastus Salisbury Field, 1805-1900," the first comprehensive exhibition of works by the American folk artist, which was organized by the Springfield Museum of Art in Massachusetts, opens jointly at the National Portrait Gallery and National Museum of American Art. |
| June 9, 1984 | "Artistic Collaboration in the Twentieth Century," with over 100 works created by seventy teams of artists between 1913 and 1984, opens at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. |
| June 10, 1968 | Ground is broken for the new Hospital and Research Building at the National Zoological Park. |
| June 10, 1977 | "Recent Works in Metal by Albert Paley" and "Iron, Solid Wrought/USA" open at the Renwick Gallery. "Recent Works in Metal" includes gold and silver pendants and brooches, and ten iron objects created during the last two years. The Award-winning handwrought iron gates designed and fabricated by Paley for the Renwick's Museum Shop can also be seen. "Iron, Solid Wrought/USA" includes approximately 100 objects, both historical and contemporary, celebrate the blacksmith as an artist and craftsman from 1776 to 1976. |
| June 10, 1980 |  "Hair," an exhibition consisting of 350 objects on the history
of hair styles, opens at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City. |
| June 11, 1868 | United States Congress authorizes the Secretary of War to provide rations for 25 men on the expedition to the Colorado River, under the direction of John Wesley Powell. His first expedition, in 1869, is otherwise funded by his own salary and small grants from Illinois scientific societies. Powell later headed the Bureau of Ethnology at the Smithsonian and donated many of the objects he collected on expeditions to the United States National Museum. |
| June 12, 1878 | A system of electric bells and telephones is established throughout the Smithsonian Institution Building, the Castle. The system connects several office and work rooms in the building to provide instant communication between the rooms so as not to loose the time required to go from one room to another. |
| June 13, 1853 | Work commences on the construction of a fireproof interior for the Smithsonian Institution Building based upon the plans of Captain B.S. Alexander of the United States [Army] Corps of Engineers. In 1852, Alexander had replaced Mr. James Renwick, Jr., whose contract as architect concluded. Gilbert Cameron is allowed to continue as contractor. |
| June 14, 1974 | "In the Minds and Hearts of the People- Prologue to the American Revolution 1760-1774," which is the first of three major Bicentennial exhibitions to be produced by the National Portrait Gallery, opens, and is on display until November 17. An authentic tea chest thrown overboard during the Boston Tea Party was discovered in the possession of a citizen of Texas only five days prior to the opening of the exhibit. |
| June 15, 1904 |  The ground is broken by Secretary Samuel P. Langley for the new United
States National Museum building (now known as the Natural History Building) at Tenth
Street, N.W., on the south side of what is now Constitution Avenue. |
| June 16, 1977 | "The Photography of Leland Rice" opens at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the museum's first exhibition of contemporary photography. |
| June 17, 1978 | Four Emmys are awarded to the film "Celebrating a Century," produced by the Motion Picture Unit, Office of Exhibits, by the Washington Chapter, National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. |
| June 18, 1873 |  The International Exchange Service begins exchanging sets of United States Government
documents with foreign governments. The first Smithsonian Secretary, Joseph Henry, began the systematic exchange of publications between the U.S. and abroad, to ensure that American science was recognized internationally. |
| June 19, 1980 | Six young peregrine falcons are placed in a small hutch on the tower of the Smithsonian Institution Building, the "Castle," in a project of the Peregrine Fund at Cornell University in an attempt to reestablish a wild breeding population of these falcons on the east coast. |
| June 20, 1878 | United States Congress approves a measure for the authorization of Secretary Spencer F. Baird to "receive a diploma and medal, constituting him a member of the Norwegian order of St. Olaf, tendered him by the King of Sweden, as a testimonial of distinguished scientific service." |
| June 20, 1911 |  The new National Museum Building (now the National Museum of Natural
History) is formally completed. The building houses anthropological, art, historical, and natural history collections. Many of the historical exhibits remain in the Arts and Industries Building. |
| June 21, 1983 |  Ground is broken for the new Center for African, Near Eastern, and Asian
Cultures, which will house a new museum of Asian art (the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery), the
National Museum of African Art, and the International Center. |
| June 22, 1975 | The National Zoological Park's Conservation and Research Center is established on 3,100 acres at Front Royal, Virginia, to encourage development of all aspects of animal sciences. It trains wildlife biologists from developing countries, and breeds, houses, and conducts research on a range of endangered species. |
| June 23, 1983 | The seventeenth annual Festival of American Folklife features the traditional culture of the state of New Jersey, the folk traditions of France and French-American communities, and the 200th anniversary of manned flight. The second annual National Heritage Fellowships are awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts to sixteen musicians and craftspeople, and the exhibition in the National Museum of American History highlights the accomplishments of these recipients. |
| June 23, 1992 | "American Encounters" at the National Museum of American History opens. |
| June 24, 1953 | In a ceremony rededicating the tomb of James Smithson in the Smithsonian Institution Building, Sir Roger Makins, the British ambassador, and Sir John Cockcroft present a Union Jack to be displayed with the Stars and Stripes beside the tomb as a "symbol of international understanding." |
| June 25, 1971 |  "Apollo 11 Moon Landing" exhibition opens as part of the
National Air and Space Museum in the Arts and Industries Building. The exhibition contains
items connected with flights of the Apollo program including a "lunar rock box,"
lunar space suits, a lunar landing module identical to those used in the Apollo program,
and other devices used on actual flights or in training. |
| June 26, 1967 |  The Underwater Exploration section of the Hall of Armed Forces History
opens in the Museum of History and Technology, now the National Museum of American
History. The exhibition explores the study of historic underwater sites and trade routes
in the Western Hemisphere, Spanish-American treasure, the history of diving, modern
methods of diving and of locating wrecks, and surveying, measuring, and recovery
techniques. Display objects come from sites dating as early as 1595. The use of diving
techniques in various disciplines and new deep-diving research are presented in
photographs and models. |
| June 27, 1829 |  James Smithson dies in Genoa, Italy. He is buried in the Protestant
cemetery, about a mile west of Genoa, on a high elevation overlooking the town of
Sampierdarena. His will provides for the creation of an institution for "the increase and diffusion of knowledge." |
| June 27, 1984 | "Southeastern Potteries," which features works from the thirty-five traditional potteries still operating in the southern United States, organized by the Office of Folklife Programs for the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, opens at the National Museum of American History. |
| June 28, 1995 |  The "Enola Gay" exhibition opens at the National Air and Space
Museum. This controversial exhibit is about the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. |
| June 29, 1959 |  Smokey Bear, a four-month-old orphaned black cub rescued from a forest
fire in Lincoln National Forest in New Mexico, arrives at the National Zoological Park.
The National Park Service erects an exhibit next to Smokey's cage, and the bear becomes a
famous symbol of fire prevention. Smokey died in 1976 and was replaced by Smokey Bear II. |
| June 29, 1977 | On the west lawn of the National Air and Space Museum, Carlos A. Perez, President of Venezuela, dedicates Alejandro Otero's "Delta Solar" sculpture, his country's Bicentennial of the American Revolution gift to the United States. The sculpture is made up of stainless steel "sails" that turn in the breeze and are mounted in an open geometric grid within the 27- by 40-foot delta-shaped piece. |
| June 30, 1977 |  The National Zoological Park's new trail graphics system is inaugurated.
The walks, which are color-coded, include tall totems of precast concrete at each
beginning and end, with pictographs showing the various animals to be seen along the way
and the length of the trail, walking time, services found on the trail, and a map showing
the complete system, along with the appropriate animal footprint. |
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