19 December 2011 – Will Walker 4
The Smithsonian is, of course, not the only institution associated with the federal government that maintains an archive about its own history. The National Park Service, for example, has made a substantial investment in documenting the histories of its parks. Read More
07 December 2011 – Margo Shea 6
Read MoreMaps are more than pieces of paper. They are stories, conversations, lives and songs lived out in a place and are inseparable from the political and cultural contexts in which they are used. (A. Warren, cited in Giacomo Rambaldi, “Who Owns the Map Legend?
28 November 2011 – Mary Rizzo 1
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| The Toynbee Tiler’s main style, in Philadelphia’s Center City. |
At its heart an exhibition is a display of objects, grouped together by a shared theme, style or message, and designed for public consumption. In the award-winning 2011 documentary Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles, four men from Philadelphia search for the creator of an idiosyncratic series of public art pieces that, in its consistency and repetition, can be seen as an exhibition. Read More
08 November 2011 – Zachary McKiernan 2
I have been traveling to and from Chile for various reasons at various times since 2005, acquiring a deep appreciation for the country and its cultural subtleties and social mores—to say nothing of a Spanish accent steeped in Chilean slang. But if I have learned anything since my initial days, it is that one must exercise sensitivity when approaching the dictatorial past. Read More
02 November 2011 – Cathy Stanton 5
22 September 2011 – Suzanne Fischer
Hey, handsome stranger
Saw your pic in the archives
Too bad you’re dead now
Rebecca Goldman, winner, Archival Haiku 2011
05 September 2011 – Matthew Barlow 1
Canadian governments on both sides of the political spectrum since the Second World War have been much less willing to invest in the country’s military (the world’s fourth-largest in 1945, but only the 56th today) than in the image of Canada as peace keeper (most notably through the invention of the UN Peacekeepers by Canadian diplomat and later Prime Minister Lester Pearson). Read More
14 August 2011 – Cathy Stanton
There’s no doubt that my favorite news story of the week is the one about policemen in Rome going undercover as tourists, garbage collectors, and–yes–gladiators in order to cool the jets of rival groups of real faux gladiators who pose for tourists’ photographs near the Roman Coliseum and elsewhere. Read More
29 July 2011 – Will Walker
The recent reviews of Ken Burns’ National Parks film in The Public Historian got me thinking about the NPS site in my hometown, Oyster Bay, Long Island. Sagamore Hill was the home of Theodore Roosevelt for most of his adult life, and it was where he died in 1919. Read More
22 July 2011 – Allison Marsh 2
3…2…1… We have lift off! Space shuttle Atlantis blasted off for her final voyage on July 8, marking the end of NASA’s 30-year old shuttle program, and I was there. Honestly, it is bigger on TV. But television doesn’t adequately capture the physical sensation of participation. Read More