Description: Apparently black holes are not a one-way vortex we assumed. This image from NASA demonstrates objects projecting out of black holes! [via The Space Academy]The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History will acquire records of The Academy of Washington, D.C., an LGBT organization that produced nationally-recognized drag pageants. [via Washington Blade]You can vote on
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="326" caption="View of the Thrift Drugs Pharmacy and Luncheonette at 533 Liberty Avenue, September 11th, 1952, P"][/caption] My chosen Friday time-suck?: geotag, explore, and help ID thousands of historic photos of Pittsburgh on Retrographer.org [via Marguerite Roby, SIA]. Pretty cool! Thousands of new objects from the Smithsonian’s
Description: The Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery and National Museum of African American History and Culture acquired a portrait of Henrietta Lacks, the African American woman whose cells were unknowingly contributed to over 10,000 medical patents, aiding research and benefiting patients with polio, AIDS, Parkinson’s disease and other conditions. [via Smithsonian
Description: I couldn’t resist this collection of beautiful butterfly and creepy crawly engravings from BibliOdyssey this week. The Smithsonian has created a new Facebook page in honor of the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War, which we’ll regularly be contributing to. Hop on over and like the page! Apparently, it was not only illegal, but criminal for women to vote! Photos uncovered by
Description: [caption id="" align="alignright" width="194" caption="Painting found in Yale Art Gallery's storage, Attributed to Diego Velázquez, The Education of the Virgin (detail shown), ca. 1617–18. Oil on canvas. Yale University Art Gallery."][/caption] Golly gee—sometimes some pretty incredible things are found in museum storage [via @museumnerd]. I worked peripherally on MIT’s
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="336" caption="South Beach, Miami, Florida, 2004, Courtesy of the TypArchive: www.typarchive.com."] [/caption] A visual archive of hand-painted and cool old signage [via @leetranlam]. Check out the Smithsonian Libraries’ extensive links to online exhibitions created by libraries and archives. Catch the spirit! The Gospel Music History
Description: [caption id="attachment_4184" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Obama Billboard in Times Square, New York, January 7, 2010, Courtesy of Marvin Heiferman."][/caption] Both the media and Times Square were aflutter recently over a photograph of President Obama used without permission on a huge two-sided billboard in midtown Manhattan to advertise men’s coats.
Description: In the past week, a series of six more images from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Chandra X-ray team were uploaded to the Flickr Commons. Incidentally, they are all images of supernovas and black holes. Visualizing black holes is a challenge (at least for me) as the term conjures up images in my own head of silent, black infinity. But luckily for us (and as you
Description: Several SIA Archivists participated in the 2012 Society of American Archivists confernence, discussing such topics as archiving websites, Encoded Archival Context (EAD) and the Fieldbook Project.
Description: [caption id="attachment_3065" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Detail of a vinyl advertisement, Chennai, India, 2004, by Preminda Jacob."][/caption] It’s interesting to think about how shrewdly and often free still photography is used to get us to pay to watch motion pictures. Still photographs—often shot by special photographers on sound stages or on location, just