Natural Resources - Overview
The natural resources collections offer centuries of evidence about how Americans have used the bounty of the American continent and coastal waters. Artifacts related to flood control, dam construction, and irrigation illustrate the nation's attempts to manage the natural world. Oil-drilling, iron-mining, and steel-making artifacts show the connection between natural resources and industrial strength.
Forestry is represented by saws, axes, a smokejumper's suit, and many other objects. Hooks, nets, and other gear from New England fisheries of the late 1800s are among the fishing artifacts, as well as more recent acquisitions from the Pacific Northwest and Chesapeake Bay. Whaling artifacts include harpoons, lances, scrimshaw etchings in whalebone, and several paintings of a whaler's work at sea. The modern environmental movement has contributed buttons and other protest artifacts on issues from scenic rivers to biodiversity.
"Natural Resources - Overview" showing 675 items.
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Environmental Button
- Description
- The Everglades is an extensive subtropical marshland in southern Florida. Marjory Stoneman Douglas, author of the 1947 book The Everglades: River of Grass, was influential in educating the public on the importance of this unique ecological area. The Everglades is still one of the nation’s biggest environmental battlegrounds as a result of ongoing fights over water use and distribution. Over 50% of its original area has been lost to agriculture and development.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0840
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0840
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- April 21, 1988 was designated John Muir day by president Ronald Reagan. The event celebrated the 150th Anniversary of the birth of the native Scotsman, who relocated to California and became America’s most well known naturalist. Amongst other achievements, Muir was an early proponent for the establishment of the National Park Service and founder of the preservation group, the Sierra Club. Muir died in 1914.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0865
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0865
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- This button declares, with a humorous slant, the wearer’s interest in preserving wilderness areas.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0870
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0870
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- The California condor decreased in population steadily throughout the 20th century. In 1985 there were believed to be less than two dozen birds left in the wild. That year, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service embarked upon a controversial program to collect the remaining California condors and breed them in captivity. Due to the success of the program, the condor population now reaches over 240 birds, with over 100 released into areas of California, Arizona and Baja, Mexico.
- maker
- Badge-A-Minit
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0910
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0910
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- “Friends of the Earth,” an organization promoting global conservation, was founded in 1969 by David Brower (1914-2000). He created the group after leaving the Sierra Club, for which he served as Executive Director from 1952 to 1969. Brower, who had a long career as an activist, is considered one of the nation’s most important naturalists.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0930
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0930
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- David Hill founded the Rare Animal Relief Effort (RARE), in 1973. RARE is well known for its “Save the Whales” campaigns and has helped to protect other at risk animal populations such as manatees and Saint Lucia parrots.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0968
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0968
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- This button depicts the polar bear, one of the most beloved species on the planet. It, along with the whale, gorilla, and elephant, is sometimes referred to as “charismatic megafauna” because of its popularity with humans.
- Environmental groups have often used charismatic megafauna in campaigns to increase public awareness about conservation efforts. By employing people’s inherent interest in these animals, they are able to attract attention towards needs which might otherwise have been disregarded. For example the polar bear has been used to highlight issues ranging from wilderness preservation to climate change.
- Date made
- 1987
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.0976
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.0976
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- The button featured here was likely produced for Arbor Day, a holiday observed in the United States on the last Friday in April. Arbor Day, started by J. Sterling Morton of Nebraska in 1872, encourages folks to plant and care for trees.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.1066
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.1066
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- The world’s oceans have been used by industry and governments for many years as a convenient sink for dumping waste products, including radioactive materials and other hazardous substances. Efforts to curb that practice intensified in the 1970s when international conventions attempted to tightly control or ban it outright.
- maker
- Donnelly/Colt Buttons
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.1118
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.1118
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Environmental Button
- Description
- Canadian activists opposed to nuclear testing in Alaska founded Greenpeace in 1971. The international organization has since turned its attention to a variety of environmental concerns, such as whaling, bottom trawling, global warming, nuclear power, and genetic engineering.
- ID Number
- 2003.0014.1156
- accession number
- 2003.0014
- catalog number
- 2003.0014.1156
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center