Description: How has the Smithsonian been portrayed in popular culture – fiction writing, movies and television, over the last 160 years and has its popular imaged changed?
Description: [edan-image:id=siris_sic_8698,size=300,left]Today marks the forty-fourth anniversary of the opening of the Anacostia Community Museum (ACM), then called the Anacostia Neighborhood Museum. The ACM opened in 1967 at the old Carver Theater in the Anacostia section of Washington, DC. The “experimental community museum” was first suggested by the Smithsonian’s eighth Secretary S.
Description: Looking at a recently acquired collection records created and maintained by former National Air and Space Museum director, Martin Harwit, that relate to the Enola Gay, its exhibition, and the controversy that ensued.
Description: In a Presidential election year, political news coverage can sometimes seem almost too instantaneous and continuous. Thanks to smartphones with cameras and microphones, journalists and citizens can relay images and sound from almost anywhere inside campaign activities. There was a time, however, when live broadcasting from political conventions and rallies was novel.Starting
Description: Long ago and far away, before gray hairs and creaky knees, before history became my passion, I was an undergraduate physics major. Physics seemed fascinating and beautiful, if difficult. Later, after career paths led into history and science policy, I learned that physics, however elegant, did not reside in a cultural vacuum. Its people and discoveries coexisted with
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="" align="aligncenter" width="303" caption="Photographer holding large folding camera, by unidentified photographer, c. 1935, National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center, Archives Center."][/caption] Recently photography has said goodbye to two industry icons. Polaroid stopped production of its instant film, and Kodak announced that it is
Description: Like Lou Costello or Mo of the Three Stooges whenever I hear the name “Niagara Falls” I pause and take a turn. One turn is to, of course, remember the classic comedy routine (when I was growing up it seemed to play on TV all the time) that involves the interactions between a once prosperous and educated bum and an unsuspecting citizen who doesn’t have a clue about the