Description: Before Congress created the National Zoo, the Smithsonian's Department of Living Animals kept it’s collection of animals behind the Castle.
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="360" caption="Steven Cohn, the Smithsonian’s Office of Safety, Health and Environmental Management and the museum’s representative Industrial Hygienist, tests Owney's fur for arsenic, lead and mercury. Courtesy of the National Postal Museum "Pushing the Envelope" blog."][/caption] More interesting preservation challenges. We’ve covered
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="384" caption="Architect's Model of the Smithsonian Institution Castle, 1846, by Unidentified photographer, Daguerreotype, National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center, Division of Information Technology and Communications, Image ID: AFS 140."][/caption] In 2000, as an answer to the question, “does the Smithsonian have
Description: The Smithsonian Institution has long been known for both its original research and its exhibitions. But, it was not until 1980 that the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) first exhibited an on-going active research project, the world's first indoor living coral reef.[edan-image:id=siris_sic_7411,size=450,center]In the late 1960s, when NMNH paleobiologist Walter H. Adey
Description: 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 researching recently, and you’ll get into some
Description: [caption id="attachment_11498" align="aligncenter" width="360" caption="Out of The Depths, or, the Triumph of the Cross by Nellie Arnold Plummer. AHC 2003.0025.1, in its custom clamshell box after full conservation (inset: before treatment condition), Courtesy Nora Lockshin and Anacostia Community Museum."][/caption] The Smithsonian Institution Archives will be
Description: [caption id="attachment_2093" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="R•I•T Big Shot No. 1, HIGHLAND HOSPITAL, Rochester, New York USA, produced by The Highland Hospital, The RIT Biomedical Photographic Communications Dept., Other Students, Faculty & Friends of RIT Photography, December 4, 1987."][/caption] In December of 1987, professors William DuBois and Michael Peres of