Description: A new exhibition offers a chance to explore the world of Grand Tour travel in the late eighteenth century, similar to that experienced by the Smithsonian’s own founding donor, James Smithson.
Description: Link Love: a weekly post with links to interesting videos and stories about archival issues, technology and culture, and Washington D.C. and American history.
Description: [edan-image:id=siris_sic_10581,size=200,left]Vicarious research is one of the great joys of the reference desk at the Smithsonian Institution Archives. From our front-row (well, only-row) seat outside the reading room, we catch tantalizing glimpses of our patrons’ manifold research topics.The reference team fields around 6,000 queries per year. Ask us what people have been
Description: Each week, the Archives features a woman who has been a groundbreaker at the Smithsonian, past or present, in a series titled Wonderful Women Wednesday.
Description: Have you ever wondered why museums choose the exhibition topics they do? These are the kinds of questions that the Smithsonian Institution Archives’ historic records of exhibitions can sometimes help us answer. An idea could stem from the personal interest of a curator, reflect an institution’s holdings, be inspired by comments from a visitor, or be designed around a specific
Description: [caption id="" align="alignright" width="193" caption="Camel cigarette advertisement from Vanity Fair, 1934, by Unknown creator, Smithsonian Institution Libraries, ID: SIL7-78-03."][/caption] Cigarettes and gardenias . . . The Smithsonian Institution Libraries blog checks out old trade literature on women, commerce, and society. Beautiful digital flipbooks at Mediastorm. I
Description: Planning a museum or gallery exhibition takes a lot of work as seen through exhibition records that contain images, layouts, object labels, memos, and other important materials.