Affiliates in the News! July 2013

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Congrats to these Affiliates making news! Each month we highlight Affiliate-Smithsonian and Affiliate-Affiliate collaborations making headlines.  If you have a clipping highlighting a collaboration with the Smithsonian or with a fellow Affiliate you’d like to have considered for the Affiliate blog, please contact Elizabeth Bugbee.

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Telluride Historical Museum Executive Director Erica Kinias demonstrates the restored Pelton Wheel, which uses water to generate electricity. The museum was recently named a Smithsonian Affiliate. Photo by Heather Sackett.

Telluride Historical Museum (Telluride, Colorado)
Sharing History: Telluride Historical Museum named Smithsonian Affiliate
Telluride Historical Museum Chronicles Area Gold Rush to Ghost Town

South Dakota State Historical Society (Pierre, S.D.)
Museum of State Historical Society to Host Live Smithsonian Webcast on July 20
State Historical Society offers free videos

Mennello Museum of American Art (Orlando, FL)
‘Earl Cunningham’s Everglades’ at Mennello Museum

Kentucky Historical Society (Frankfort, KY)
Historical Society Joins Smithsonian Family
Kentucky Historical Society Now a Smithsonian Affiliate
KHS Set To Announce Smithsonian Partnership
Kentucky Historical Society forming affiliation with Smithsonian Institution

Elvis on the Southern Railroad between Chattanooga and Memphis, Tenn. July 4, 1956. © Alfred Wertheimer.

Elvis on the Southern Railroad between Chattanooga and Memphis, Tenn.
July 4, 1956. © Alfred Wertheimer.

Senator John Heinz History Center (Pittsburgh, PA)
History Center Exhibit explores Pennsylvania’s impact on the Civil War
Heinz History Center exhibition highlights Pa. role in Civil War
Center brings big guns to Pa. Civil War exhibit

Fort Worth Museum of Science and History (Fort Worth, TX)
Elvis in a history museum? Fort Worth photos are a swivel-hipping hit
Hanging Out with Elvis in Fort Worth
‘Elvis at 21’ exhibit at Fort Worth Science Museum proves interesting even for non-fans
Elvis at 21 delves into the puzzling nature of sex appeal, charisma, and intimacy

Berkshire Museum (Pittsfield, MA)
Berkshire Museum now a Smithsonian affiliate
Berkshire Museum becomes Smithsonian Affiliate, First Museum in Western MA to earn designation
Berkshire Museum named affiliate of Smithsonian Institution

David Ward of the National Portrait Gallery discusses a painting by Roger Shimomura.

David Ward of the National Portrait Gallery discusses a painting by Roger Shimomura at the Japanese American National Museum.

Japanese American National Museum (Los Angeles, CA)
A Self-portrait of Asian America: Smithsonian co-presents art exhibition at JANM
Seven citizens, seven stories: the performance “fighting for democracy” heads from Philly to DC
May Issue: First Asian American Exhibit Debuts at the Smithsonian

Schiele Museum of Natural History (Gastonia, NC)
Stay at home safari exhibit takes guests on tour of wild kingdom

Idaho Museum of Natural History (Pocatello, ID)
Digital Specimens

Miami Science Museum (Miami, FL)
2013 Smithsonian Online Education Conference Series Presents Two Sessions on Astrophotography

Mashantucket Pequot Museum (Mashantucket, CT)
Ramp It Up! Skateboard Exhibit Moves to Pequot Museum

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Featured video: Smithsonian Firearms in Cody

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Sharing a great article from By Katharine MacKnight at KULR-8 TV in Billings, Montana.

In 1876, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History established the National Firearms Collection in Washington, DC. It’s the home to nearly 7,000 artifacts. Sixty-four of them are now on display at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West Firearms Exhibit. It’s one of the largest collections of firearms to come out of the Smithsonian.

“It’s for people who love firearms and know a lot about them and also for people who don’t know a lot and would like to come in and learn why it’s important to American history,” says Ashley Lynn Hlebinsky, Firearms Curatorial Resident at the Buffalo Bills Center of the West Firearm Exhibit.

“Journeying West: Distinctive Firearms from the Smithsonian” is an exhibition at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West. It was a carefully researched and planned out process that took Curator Warren Newman years to bring together.

Read the entire article here- https://www.kulr8.com/story/22879382/smithsonian-firearms-in-cody
KULR-8 Television, Billings, MT

take me out to the ballgame

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Summer is upon us, which means the baseball season is literally in full swing.  Nothing says America more than a sunny afternoon at the ballpark with a hot dog and ball cap, cheering on your favorite team.

Now baseball fans can share their passion outside the ballpark too, with a new initiative launched by the National Museum of American Jewish History, our Affiliate in Philadelphia.  The museum is inviting fans of all ages and backgrounds to submit artifacts, photos, and memorabilia that illustrate their connections to the game.  This collecting effort and national conversation will support a major exhibition opening at the Museum in spring 2014 called Chasing Dreams: Baseball and Jews in America. 

Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax during the 1966 World Series

Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax during the 1966 World Series

This exhibition (which is expected to travel around the country) is the first major exhibition to weave together the history of American sport, leisure and national identity with the story of Jewish immigration and integration into American life.  The exhibition will also tell the stories of other minority groups – including African-Americans, Latinos, Italian and Japanese immigrants – for whom baseball provided an important sense of belonging and pride.

The public is invited to share stories and memories of how baseball has affected generations of fans and their communities through the Museum’s site – chasingdreamsbaseball.tumblr.com.  Here, fans can post images of their memorabilia and share their stories with the Museum’s curators and fellow baseball aficionados.

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Sandy Koufax’ glove, on view at NMAJH, 2010-2012

Those who have visited the National Museum of American Jewish History in the past have likely seen Sandy Koufax’s glove, on loan from the Smithsonian and on view in Philadelphia when the Museum opened in its current location in 2010. 

For more information on the exhibition or public collecting initiative, please read the press release, or visit the Museum’s website at www.nmajh.org.

Just think, here’s something else you can do during the seventh inning stretch!

affiliates in the news, spring 2013 edition

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Affiliates are making news this month!

National Atomic Testing Museum (Las Vegas, Nevada)
Las Vegas museum tells of city’s history with nuclear testing

 

North Carolina Museum of History (Raleigh, North Carolina)
Exhibition featuring 19th-century African American master cabinetmaker Thomas Day opens at Renwick Gallery April 12

 

Mennello Museum of American Art (Orlando, Florida)
Live Active Cultures: Orlando’s balance of old and new: 20th-century canvases and a world-premiere play just a few hundred yards apart.

 

National Civil War Museum (Harrisburg, Pennsylvania) and the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History (Kennesaw, Georgia)
Medal of Honor 150: The National Civil War Museum gathers 6 examples of highest honor

 

Mashantucket Pequot Museum (Mashantucket, CT)
Ramp It Up’ at museum

 
Abbe Museum (Bar Harbor, ME)
Abbe will partner with Smithsonian

kudos affiliates! for may 2013

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Spring has sprung, and 2013 continues to be a successful one for our Affiliates!

Funding

The Ohio Historical Society (Columbus, Ohio) has received $155,000 from the Ohio General Assembly for repairs on the sternwheeler W.P. Snyder.  The Society also received two awards from The National Endowment for the neh_at_logoHumanities: one for $248,600 to continue the digitization of Ohio’s microfilmed newspapers as part of the National Digital Newspaper Program and one for $359,994 to support a project to increase and share knowledge about Midwestern Native American tribes with community college educators.  

Michigan State University Museum (East Lansing, Michigan)  received  a $1.9 million gift to create the first endowed curatorship. The Berryman MSU Museum Curator of History Endowment established by Julie Avery, Stephen Stier and Val Berryman will create a new curator position for the museum’s historical collections. 

Hugh Moore Park, home of the National Canal Museum,  (Easton, Pennsylvania) will receive $475,000 in upgrades, including a canal-themed playground, an outdoor classroom and signs detailing the park’s historical elements. $175,000 will be from a state grant for the project and the rest of the funds will come from the Hugh Moore Trust. 

Awards/Recognition

greenglobes-165The Perot Museum of Nature and Science (Dallas, Texas) recently achieved a four Green Globes(R) rating from the Green Building Initiative for its sustainability practices. The museum’s achievement is a rare feat — only 12 out of 759 Green Globes certified buildings in the US have achieved four Globes.

Executive Transitions

Smithsonian Affiliations would like to welcome the following new directors to the Affiliate network:
– Patrick D. Lyons, Ph.D. will be the new director of Arizona State Museum (Tucson, Arizona)
– Ramiro A. Ortiz and Stuart A. Chase who have been named to lead HistoryMiami (Miami, Florida)
– Kay Peninger recently started as executive director of the Charlotte Museum of History (Charlotte, North Carolina)

Affiliates in the news: March-April 2013

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Each month we’re highlighting Affiliate-Smithsonian and Affiliate-Affiliate collaborations making headlines. Congrats to these Affiliates making news this month! If you have a clipping you’d like to have considered for the Affiliate blog, please contact Elizabeth Bugbee.

(Michael Johnson/Daily News)

(Michael Johnson/Daily News)

New Mexico Museum of Space History (Alamogordo, N.M.)
Apollo Capsule Lands at New Mexico Space Museum
Space history museum will become Smithsonian affiliate
New Mexico Museum of Space History First State Museum to Obtain Smithsonian Affiliation
Governor Proclaims “New Mexico Museum of Space History Day”
NMMSH now a Smithsonian affiliate; gets Apollo boilerplate 1207 

Senator John Heinz History Center (Pittsburgh, Pa.)
Let’s Learn From the Past: Apollo 8 mission 

History Colorado (Denver, Colo.)
Thomas Jefferson’s Bible Coming to Denver
History Colorado Center offers rare glimpse of Thomas Jefferson’s Bible
Thomas Jefferson’s Bible Coming to Denver’s History Colorado Center 

Agua Caliente Cultural Museum (Palm Springs, Calif.)
Film fans gather at Palm Springs annual Native FilmFest 

Littleton Museum (Littleton, Colo.)
`Ramp It Up’ offers glimpse of culture 

Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History (Kennesaw, Georgia) and the National Civil War Museum (Harrisburg, Pa.)
Southern Museum Executive Director to Speak at National Civil War Museum

Senior paper conservator Janice Stagnitto Ellis, left, and political history curator Harry Rubenstein of the Smithonian’s National Museum of American History discuss Thomas Jefferson’s Bible at History Colorado Center on Wednesday. (Photos by Hyoung Chang, The Denver Post)