Description: Back in December, I wrote a post about Emory University’s efforts to make the writer Salman Rushdie’s digital files available to fans, researchers, and interested parties. A couple of days ago, I came across an interesting report about a gathering, an “unconference,” that was sponsored by the University of Virginia’s Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, which
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: [caption id="" align="alignright" width="186" caption="Waistcoat, France, 1790, Silk embroidery on silk plain weave, linen back, 60 x 50 cm (23 5/8 x 19 11/16 in.), Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Bequest of Richard Cranch Greenleaf in memory of his mother, Adeline Emma Greenleaf, Photo: Steve Tague, Courtesy of the Cooper-Hewitt
Description: Outgoing Director, Anne Van Camp, Smithsonian Institution Archives, developed economic models for long-term digital record preservation on NSF’s Task Force on Sustainable Digital Preservation and Access, and she greatly increased access to and stewardship of the Archives’ collections. #Groundbreaker
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: An important part of the museum story that we often forget: how the objects got there in the first place. Donors’ stories often reveal the fascinating and complicated path that object take before they come into the Smithsonian’s collections. Here’s a great read on a family who collected celluloid (plastic) souvenirs, jewelry, products, and knick-knacks, that now reside at the