| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| September 1, 1975 |  The north hall displaying "famous firsts" in aviation and space
flight history in the Arts and Industries Building is scheduled to close on September 1 so
that the building may be renovated for the Bicentennial of the American Revolution exhibit. This hall was the last
section of the A&I Building still open to the public. |
| September 2,1980 | "Electroworks" an exhibition of some 250 works tracing the development of copy machine art, opens at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York. |
| September 3, 1974 | The Charles Willson Peale Papers project is established under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Lillian B. Miller, Historian of American Culture at the National Portrait Gallery, is appointed editor. |
| September 4, 1977 |  The National Air and Space Museum's first annual Frisbee Festival is held,
with demonstrations and workshops, on the Mall. |
| September 5, 1969 | "Pharmacy in Prints" opens at the National Museum of History and Technology, now the National Museum of American History. The exhibition is composed of portraits, caricatures, broadsides and labels ranging from the satiric and political to the social and ethical. These prints show the doctor-pharmacist-patient relationship. |
| September 6, 1988 | The Freer Gallery of Art closes for major construction that will provide underground access between the Freer and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. The project triples the Freer space for art conservation and technical study, increases its collection storage facilities by 70 percent, and offers greater access to visitors with mobility impairments. |
| September 7, 1988 | A new veterinary hospital opens at the National Zoological Park, providing state-of-the-art medical and surgical care for the animals. It houses the Zoo's Department of Animal Health and Department of Animal Pathology. |
| September 8, 1994 | The Office of Telecommunications film, "Dream Windows: Reflections on the Japanese Garden," wins an Emmy Award for cinematography at the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences awards ceremony on September 8, 1994. Laura Schneider, senior producer, and Foster Wiley, director of photography, attend the ceremony and receive the award. |
| September 9, 1983 | "Provincetown Printers: A Woodcut Tradition" opens a the National Museum of American Art. The exhibition includes 75 works by Provincetown, Massachusetts, artists, including the original six who returned from Paris at the outbreak of World War I. The artists were a group dedicated the innovative use of the wood-block printing process during the early decades of the twentieth century. |
| September 10, 1993 |  The newly renovated Orkin Insect Zoo opens in the National Museum of
Natural History. With this renovation one of the museum's most popular attractions is
expanded with an entirely new exhibition. The insect zoo, a collaboration between public
programs staff and museum entomologists, features a large variety of live insects and many
hands-on activities to encourage visitors of all ages to learn more about our diverse
natural environment. |
| September 11, 1988 |  The Smithsonian Institution returns human remains from the collection of
the National Museum of Natural History to a delegation of the Blackfeet Tribe of Montana.
A small ceremony was held outside near the Constitution Avenue entrance, and a peace pipe
was passed. |
| September 12, 1979 |  The Dalai Lama visits the Freer Gallery of Art for a tour of the
collections and views Smithsonian films about vanishing Tibetan Buddhist culture. |
| September 13, 1992 | The first Komodo dragon (Varanus komodoensis) ever born outside its native Indonesia is hatched at George Mason University on September 13; the egg had been laid 237 days earlier at the National Zoological Park. Within four weeks, a total of 13 Komodo dragons hatched at George Mason and at the Zoo, comprising the largest hatching of Komodo dragons on record, in zoos or in the wild. The exhibit had been expanded in 1990, creating a separate nesting area for the female, to encourage breeding. The keeper observed courtship activity from December 7 through December 29, 1991; on January 17, 1992 the female dug a new burrow and six days later scientists found 26 eggs in the burrow. The eggs were removed for incubation, sending ten to a lab at GMU. The National Zoological Park becomes the first place in the Western Hemisphere to breed the rare and endangered Komodo dragon, the world's largest living species of lizard. |
| September 14, 1981 |  The Hirshhorn Museum officially reopens its Sculpture Garden after
renovation to provide access for disabled visitors. The redesign is accomplished by Lester
Collins, a Washington-based landscape architect, and includes graded ramps along the north
border of the garden to give disabled visitors access to the major viewing level. A third
ramp is built to provide access to the lower level, and pathways are resurfaced in
brick to make it wheelchair accessible. |
| September 15, 1967 |  The Anacostia Neighborhood Museum opens in Anacostia, a primarily African
American neighborhood in southeast Washington, with a celebration including an 84-piece
band. This museum, an "experimental community museum," which is located in a
renovated theater, is operated in cooperation with the local community. Its first six
exhibits include: a Mercury space capsule; a reproduction of an 1890 Anacostia store; a
little theater; shoebox collections on many natural-science subjects; skeletons that could
be disassembled; and a small zoo. |
| September 15, 1982 | It is announced that Dr. Arthur M. Sackler of New York will donate 1,000 masterpieces of Asian art from his collection valued in excess of $50 million, and $4 million to the new Smithsonian Center for African, Near Eastern, and Asian Cultures, to be named the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. |
| September 16, 1994 |  A new greenhouse for the Department of Botany opens at the Museum Support
Center in Suitland, Maryland. The new greenhouse is 6,000 square feet and contains a
section 28 feet high for the growing of palms, bananas and other tall trees. With the
addition of this greenhouse the botanists will for the first time be able to maintain a
sizable collection of living plants to study. |
| September 17, 1988 |  The grand opening of the new National Air and Space Museum Restaurant is
celebrated with a ribbon-cutting, an enormous cake made in the shape of the restaurant,
prizes, and a food trivia quiz. The architectural firm of Hellmuth, Obata, and Kassabaum,
which designed the museum, developed the design. Construction on the addition to the
museum, which seats 960, began in March of 1987. The facility included a self-service
cafeteria, "Flight Line," and a full-service dining room, "Wright
Place." |
| September 18, 1981 | "Cast and Recast: The Sculpture of Frederic Remington," which includes twenty casts of four of the sculptor's best-known works, opens at the National Museum of American Art. |
| September 19, 1994 |  I. Michael Heyman becomes the tenth Secretary of the Smithsonian
Institution in September. An environmental lawyer, Heyman was Chancellor of the University
of California at Berkeley. |
| September 20, 1996 |  The permanent exhibition "How Things Fly" opens at the National
Air and Space Museum. The exhibition offers numerous hands-on exhibits which teach
visitors how things fly. The flexible design will allow changes in the exhibit
once testing is done on displays to find out what works and what does not work with
visitors. |
| September 20, 1997 |  The new Janet Annenberg Hooker Hall of Geology, Gems and Minerals opens at the National Museum of Natural History. The hall includes the gem collection, including the
Hope Diamond and Star of Asia sapphire, and an exhibition exploring the solar system and
the Earth's changing surface. |
| September 21, 1978 | The National Portrait Gallery opens its first research exhibition in photography, entitled "Facing the Light: Historic American Portrait Daguerreotypes." |
| September 22, 1891 | A gift of $200,000 is received from Thomas George Hodgkins of Setauket, New York, to be used, in part, for studies of the atmosphere in relation to human health. At Mr. Hodgkins death in November 1892, additional gifts are left by will to the Smithsonian. On October 25, 1893, the bequest of $42,000 in West Shore Railroad bonds is received. In May 1894, an additional $8,000 is received. |
| September 23, 1916 |  Acting Secretary Richard Rathbun gives a brief address and turns the first
shovel full of earth to start the construction of the Freer Gallery of Art. |
| September 24, 1982 | "Familiar but Unique: The Monoprints of Joseph Goldyne" opens at the National Museum of American Art. The exhibition includes 51 works by the artist from 1972 to present. |
| September 25, 1970 | "The Genteel Female" a special exhibition of lithographs from the Smithsonian's Harry T. Peters America on Stone Collection depicts the romantic view of the American woman of the 19th century. The exhibition is housed in the Arts and Industries Building. |
| September 26, 1988 | The Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center, a child care center in the National Museum of American History, is dedicated. The facility, for toddlers and pre-schoolers, is the first of its kind at the Smithsonian. The Center officially opens on October 3. |
| September 27, 1976 |  The Victorian Garden, in the South Yard to the west of the Arts and
Industries Building, opens. It is the work of the Office of Horticulture, and is the
Smithsonian's first major horticultural display. |
| September 27, 1992 | "Frontiers of Flight," a 13-part television series examining the history of aviation and early space flight premieres. The series is produced by the National Air and Space Museum and the Discovery Channel. |
| September 28, 1987 |  The Quadrangle, the Smithsonian's underground museum, research, and education complex
opens. It consists of two major museums -- the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery (a museum of
Asian art) and the National Museum of African Art -- as well as the S. Dillon Ripley
Center, and is home to the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, the
International Center, and the National and Resident Associate Programs. Washington, D.C.,
Mayor Marion Barry proclaims September 28, "Smithsonian Institution Day." |
| September 29, 1970 | In a special ceremony held at the 7600-foot level of Mt. Hopkins, the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory officially dedicates its new 60-inch reflecting telescope to the memory of the late Carlton W. Tillinghast, Jr. |
| September 30, 1977 | "Raphael Soyer: Drawings and Watercolors" opens at the National Collection of Fine Arts, now the National Museum of American Art. In conjunction with the exhibition, Director Joshua Taylor and the artist hold a dialogue about Soyer's work. |
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