Description: This summer witnessed an exciting find by interns Shereen Choudhury and Rachel Midura, who identified Teddy Roosevelt in one of the broken glass plate negatives they were inventorying. This glass plate comes from a collection of images that have all been numbered, but have minimal descriptive records indicating what they may represent.
Description: To celebrate International Migratory Bird Day on May 9th, we will be releasing recently digitized specimen drawings by ornithologist Robert Ridgway (1850-1929.) Ridgway's career with the Smithsonian began in 1864 when he wrote asking for help identifying a bird. As they say, the rest is history. Starting in 1869, Ridgway became curator at the Smithsonian's United States
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="448" caption="Temperance Parade, Church of the Nazarene, Medora, Illinois, photographer unknown, real-photo postcard, 1908, Courtesy of Luc Sante, 2009."][/caption] One of the thrills of seeing—when you stop to pay attention to it—is how complex and quickly the process of looking and making sense of what we see happens. According to
Description: [caption id="attachment_7367" align="aligncenter" width="417" caption="Slide from Mike Edson, the Smithsonian's head of Web and New Media Strategy, Slideshare presentation on the Smithsonian Commons."][/caption] Just recently, the Smithsonian released a prototype of the Smithsonian Commons—a new part of the digital plan at the Smithsonian that aims to stimulate “learning,
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="331" caption="14th Street and Broadway, NYC (man with goggles), 1947, by Louis Faurer, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of anonymous donors, 2007.40.61 "][/caption] Earlier this month, Google introduced the Beta and Android-based version of the new and, for some, startling photo-based search feature they’ve calling Google Goggles.
Description: A forerunner of today’s efforts to decolonize and Indigenize American museums, Tichkematse was one of the first Native American employees at the Smithsonian Institution. His work with natural history and anthropological collections continue to inspire Native and non-Native museum professionals nearly 150 years later.
Description: Starting last fall, stories started popping up in the British media and online about photographers who’d been stopped by officials empowered to question and search them if they seemed suspicious or might have some links to terrorism.
Description: [edan-image:id=siris_arc_287602,size=250,left]As a child in England in the 1930s, Oliver Sacks enjoyed playing with his Uncle Abe’s spinthariscope. It was, he would later recall, “a beautifully simple instrument, consisting of a fluorescent screen and a magnifying eyepiece, and inside, an infinitesimal speck of radium.We take a look at the spinthariscope at the Smithsonian.