Description: For Preservation Week, our team answered our burning, often ignorant questions about their biggest challenges, what they consider when treating objects, and beyond.
Description: [caption id="" align="alignright" width="192" caption="A shot of Leafsnap, a free tree field guide app from the Smithsonian, University of Maryland, and Columbia University."][/caption] Columbia University, the University of Maryland, and the Smithsonian Institution have tapped their experts to help create the world’s first plant identification mobile app using visual search:
Description: This is the second post in our series on career advice for the aspiring archives professional. Each edition features information and career advice from a different member of the Archives team, regarding what they do, how they got here, and how you can too. Check out the first , and don’t be afraid to let us know who you might like to hear from next! Many picture an archivist
Description: Continuing our series on introducing new staff, I'd like to welcome our new Program Assistant for our Institution History Division, Lisa Fthenakis.
Description: Couldn’t we all use a little more warmth and kindness in the world? For World Kindness Day, we’re highlighting acts of kindness by Smithsonian employees that were featured in the staff newsletter, "The Torch."
Description: The Smithsonian Institution Archives YouTube channel has a new dedicated playlist for the Science Media Group Collection, which features videos from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory program that was active from 1989 to 2013.
Description: What was the Saint Augustine Monster? According to Wikipedia, it was a globster—“an unidentified organic mass that washes up on the shoreline of an ocean or other body of water.” This great-grandaddy of globsters kept cryptozoologists speculating and scientists testing for a century—and a piece of it lives at the Smithsonian. The St. Augustine monster was discovered by two
Description: Ever heard of The Impossible Project? When Polaroid announced they would stop production of instant film, these folks saved the last Polaroid production plant in the Netherlands, and started to develop new instant film with a small team of former Polaroid employees. Check out some shots of Smithsonian museums taken by Aaron Dunn and created with the fruits of their labor. What
Description: [caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="350" caption="Privacy And Control, by Michael Pickard, Creative Commons: Attribution 2.0."][/caption] It’s a sign of the times that we’re being watched often and everywhere. Surveillance, a word that once summoned up all things intrusive and sneaky, is part of everyday lexicon and experience.