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How The Guild beat Hollywood, one webisode at a time
Codex costume and staff, as worn by Felicia Day in "The Guild." Costume designed by Sarah Trost; staff designed by Greg Aronowitz....
A sports star being political, 19th-century style
There has been a lot of debate over the last few years about whether sports should be political. From NFL players taking a knee to a range...
Recovered Ruby Slippers visit museum for examination by conservators, curators . . . and FBI agents
Dawn Wallace and Richard Barden stood in the museum's objects conservation lab over two shoes. Red. Sequin-covered. Small heels. Petite in...
Blog Posts in "Stories of Freedom & Justice"
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You Asked, We Answer
Does Thanksgiving have room for both thankfulness and mourning?
Is there room in Americans’ Thanksgiving celebrations for both thankfulness and mourning?That challenging question arose as my colleagues...
Caramelo Deportivo: A card collection that blurred baseball's color line
Caramelo Deportivo baseball card album after treatment by conservation technician Verónica Mercado Oliveras. The album contains cards of...
Two objects bring the history of African American firefighting to light
It’s late winter of 2006 and an ornate silver speaking trumpet is on offer at a prestigious New York City auction house. The engraved...
Why Girlhood?
"Girlhood (It’s complicated)" opened to the public on October 9, 2020.Three years ago our museum convened a diverse group of scholars and...
"They called me 'race traitor'": Joan Trumpauer Mulholland's lifetime of resistance
Last year I began working as a stage manager for Join the Student Sit-Ins, an interactive theater program at the museum set in 1960. The...
Reflecting on Black Life In Two Pandemics
The writers of the Black Life in Two Pandemics series have examined the deep roots of racial violence in the Midwest and the connections...
COVID-19, police violence, and the historical thread that binds them: Structural racism as a public health issue
IntroductionOur political and legal systems are inextricably intertwined with and fueled by structural racism. This legacy predates the...
Art and Uprising: The George Floyd and Anti-Racist Street Art Database
In March 2020, the Urban Art Mapping research team, a small group of faculty and students from the University of St. Thomas in Saint Paul,...
A Watched Pot Never Boils
With the murder of George Floyd and the ensuing civil unrest, historians, educators, and the general public once again fixated on the “long...
Many Tulsa Massacres: How the Myth of a Liberal North Erases a Long History of White Violence
"Destruction by fire of Pennsylvania Hall, the new building of the Abolition Society, on the night of the 17th May," courtesy of Library of...
Black Life in Two Pandemics: Histories of Violence
George Floyd’s Memorial Day 2020 killing by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin shook the nation. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the...
Racism is a public health crisis
Racism has been a public health emergency in America for over 400 years. We can call it a crisis or disaster or something else entirely....
How young, undocumented organizers fought to bring DACA into existence
On June 18, 2020, the Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration could not rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA...
Empty stadiums resonate with history
After months of uncertainty, Major League Baseball will begin a shortened season at Nationals Park. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the...
John Lewis and Good Trouble
For John Lewis, activism for social change was a communal activity. He believed that people coming together to mentor, protest, and learn...
The story behind the photograph: Gay Dads Kissing, 1983
For Michael and Robert, the quick peck before a walk around the lake with Michael’s son was an ordinary moment. For J. Ross Baughman, it...
How picturing the Boston Massacre matters
Maybe this painting looks familiar. A long row of red-coated soldiers. A cloud of gun smoke engulfing the street. Falling bodies.Detail of...
Science and political protest: A Q&A with Dr. Florence Haseltine
In March 1995, Ladies Home Journal named Dr. Florence Haseltine one of the ten most important women in medicine. Haseltine, currently...
Pennies and nickels add up to success: Maggie Lena Walker
Maggie Lena Walker was one of the most important Black businesswomen in the nation, and today too few people have heard of her.Maggie Lena...
In 1868, Black suffrage was on the ballot
Every election season in the United States revolves around a set of issues—health care, foreign affairs, the economy. In 1868, at the...
How butterfly wings helped a new collecting initiative take flight
The museum has created a new collecting initiative focused on how undocumented activists are leading fights for political representation....
Does an amendment give you the right to vote?
In 2020, the Fifteenth Amendment—the first voting rights amendment added to the U.S. Constitution—celebrates its 150th anniversary. You’ve...
American dream turned nightmare
World Trade Center, September 2001, by Christophe AgouThe attacks of September 11, 2001, shocked the nation. Nearly 3,000 people were...
A place at the park: LGBTQ+ inclusion and skateboarding
When you think about the culture around skateboarding, you might think about the laid-back vibe of acceptance and inclusion that the sport...
The most radical thing about Stonewall wasn’t the uprising
The Stonewall uprising began June 28, 1969, in response to a police raid at The Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York, and has since...
The impact of the Transcontinental Railroad on Native Americans
The Transcontinental Railroad was completed 150 years ago, in 1869. In 1800s America, some saw the railroad as a symbol of modernity and...
Reading the rainbow: The origins of the pride symbol
In 2017, in response to a slew of racist incidents in the Gayborhood, Philadelphia added black and brown stripes to the traditional six-...
“Hyperlocal, ultraseasonal, uber-healthy, and utterly delicious”: Reviving indigenous food cultures
When Chef Sean Sherman began speaking about his experiences growing up on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, he shattered all-too-...
The mock battle that ended the Spanish-American War
George Dewey was promoted to the rank of rear admiral after the Battle of Manila Bay. Dewey was celebrated in American culture with songs,...
American history must-reads of 2018
These are our most fascinating blog posts of 2018, according to our readers.When FBI agents showed up with a pair of sparkly, red shoesA...
How black Philadelphians fought for soldiers during World War I
Suffering from "shell shock and a general breakdown," Charles Mackall and James Randall arrived in Philadelphia in September 1918 from...
A white collar with a message
Men’s celluloid collar, 1900sAt first glance, this collar from the 1800s might not look like much. A closer inspection shows that this...
Culture in the colonial classroom: A failed attempt at assimilation
As our Philanthropy Initiative continues to explore the history of giving, we're eager to share stories of success and failure. This story...
4 music-inspiring objects through the eyes of our Making American Music interns
Musical inspiration abounds in the collections and exhibitions around us. As interns in the Making American Music project, we get to follow...
An anti-slavery anthem reimagined for today
Turn right at the Batmobile. Take the elevator behind the John Bull locomotive. If you hit Julia Child's kitchen, you've gone too far. My...
Total eclipse of the sun, partial eclipse of inequality
"It was now quick work," Maria Mitchell noted. "As the last rays of sunlight disappeared, the corona burst out all around the sun, so...
Special Olympics at 50
"Let me win. But if I cannot win, let me be brave in the attempt."Eunice Kennedy Shriver, founder of Special Olympics, recited this oath at...
Remembering Robert Kennedy
June 6, 2018 marked the 50th anniversary of the death of Robert “Bobby” Francis Kennedy. Being a native Northern Virginian, I knew that the...
How do the arts promote social change?
The arts are "a space where we can give dignity to others while interrogating our own circumstances," Darren Walker, president of the...
You're invited to a Bowl of Rice Party
Wartime often catalyzes developments in philanthropy. In 2017, the museum added the Bowl of Rice party banner, from fundraising efforts to...
The Fair Housing Act: Fifty years later
Fifty years ago, on April 11, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed a bill that was to end discrimination in most of the nation’s housing...
Norman Granz: Revolutionizing jazz for social justice
A civil rights protest often invokes the vivid images of sit-ins, boycotts, and marches, but the fight for racial equality took many...
The case of Luisa Moreno
In my first week as a curator at the National Museum of American History, I made a list of women I wished were present in the museum's...
Madam C. J. Walker’s philanthropy
A former laundress who became a millionaire from her hair-care company, Madam C. J. Walker (1867–1919) was a leading philanthropist of the...
A new podcast: Order 9066
Each year we mark the Day of Remembrance with events recognizing Executive Order 9066, signed on February 19, 1942, after Japan’s bombing...
Making money and doing good: The story of an African American power couple from the 1800s
Artists have long been major players in American philanthropy. If that surprises you to learn, you might be further surprised to learn that...
Greensboro, Charlottesville, and the nation we build together
"I walked away with an attitude that, if our country is screwed up, don't give up. Unscrew it, but don't give up." ...
Alice Tetsuko Kono: Wise, well-traveled, WAC
Museum Specialist Noriko Sanefuji and Curator Katherine Ott invited students in Dr. Samuel J. Redman's Museum and Historic Site...
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