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Coming Up in Affiliateland in May 2021

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Spring continues to bloom at Affiliates! 

MISSOURI

Billie Holiday on stage at Sugar Hill

Billie Holiday on stage at Sugar Hill, Newark, New Jersey, April, 1957. All photographs © 2018 Jerry Dantzic/ Jerry Dantzic Archives. All rights reserved.

The American Jazz Museum will open the SITES’ exhibition Billie Holiday at Sugar Hill, in Kansas City, 5.8.

MARYLAND
Dr. Teasel Muir-Harmony, curator at the National Air and Space Museum, will give a virtual lecture on her new book Operation Moonglow for Historic Annapolis, hosted in Annapolis, 5.4.

MICHIGAN
Dr. Muir-Harmony will also talk about Operation Moonglow for the audiences of the Yankee Air Museum, hosted from Belleville, 5.5.

NEW YORK
As part of its Environments Examined series, the Rockwell Museum will host a virtual panel with scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and National Air and Space Museum, From High Tech Science to High Tech Art: Transforming Data into Action, hosted from Corning, 5.27.

Kudos Affiliates! May 2021

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Congratulations to these Affiliates on their recent accomplishments! Do you have kudos to share? Please send potential entries to Aaron Glavas, GlavasC@si.edu.

FUNDING

The Minnesota Historical Society announced the newest recipients of 30 Minnesota Historical and Cultural Heritage Small Grants including The Bakken Museum (Minneapolis, MN). The Museum received $9,994 to process the Earl Bakken Legacy Collection, allowing for greater public access to these resources. The Bakken Museum will also be a core research partner as part of a $1.5 million grant awarded to Binghamton University faculty. The grant will help improve makerspace learning for youth.

Frank Leta Honda has donated two new 2020 Honda Odyssey minivans to the Saint Louis Science Center (Saint Louis, MO) to transport Youth Exploring Science (YES) Program teens and Science Center educators to events during the summer as COVID-19 safety protocols allow. The YES Program was founded to help teens, particularly those from underserved communities, to recognize their potential in science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEAM) career fields.

Framingham State University (Framingham, MA) has been awarded a $62,250 grant from the Massachusetts Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) to coordinate a multi-day Racial Equity Policy Review Institute. Designed for up to 150 leaders within the campus community, participants will gain a better understanding of systemic racism in higher education and how it manifests on campus, be able to define what a racist policy is and how it shows up in student outcomes, and create an initial yearlong plan to undertake policy review.

History Colorado (Denver, CO), Hagley Museum (Wilmington, DE) and USS Constitution Museum  (Boston, MA) were among several Affiliates awarded humanity grants from The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Grant awards support the preservation of historic collections, humanities exhibitions and documentaries, scholarly research, and curriculum projects.

  • History Colorado was awarded a Media Projects Production grant for $310,536 to support the production of the Lost Highways Podcast series, an eight-episode offering focused on Colorado and Western history. History Colorado also received an Exhibitions-Implementation grant for $400,000 for The Sand Creek Massacre Exhibition. The permanent exhibition details the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho tribal members.
  • Hagley Museum and Library ($194,400) and Center for Jewish History (New York, NY) ($153,292), each received a Fellowship Programs grant. The grants will support 12 months of stipend support for 1–3 fellowships per year for two to three years.
  • USS Constitution Museum will receive a Dialogues on the Experience of War grant for $96,264 to develop Sailors Speak: The Impact of War on Naval Veterans, their Families, and the Country. The award will be used for the training of facilitators to lead three discussion series for naval veterans and their families, based on historical documents and material culture from the War of 1812 and the post-9/11 wars.
  • City Lore (New York, NY) was awarded an Exhibitions-Planning grant for $75,000 to create a traveling exhibit about the 1970s Federal Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA), that provided work for artists.
  • American Jewish Historical Society (New York City, NY), part of the Center for Jewish History, received $131,681 for a Humanities Collections and Reference Resources grant for The People’s Relief Committee Project to preserve and digitize materials that document the work of the People’s Relief Committee for Jewish War Sufferers (1915–1924), an American Jewish organization that sought to help Jewish communities and individuals in Europe during and after World War I.

The Rhode Island Historical Society (Providence, RI) received a donation of $50,000 from Walmart to pay for the creation of a curriculum to teach Black history and heritage in the local schools. The curriculum will include lesson plans, teacher training, and virtual learning tools.

AWARDS & RECOGNITION

The Rockwell Museum (Corning, NY) announced Janelle Steiner, events coordinator, and Kate Swanson, interpretation and public engagement educator, have been selected to participate in The Museum Association of New York’s (MANY) “Building Capacity, Creating Sustainability, Growing Accessibility” program. The IMLS Cares Act grant project is designed to help museums impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic share their collections and reach audiences who cannot physically visit their museums. In this two-year program, museums will identify an event or project to deliver virtually to their audiences, focusing on developing programs from stories found in their collections that reveal cultural and racial diversity in their communities.

LEADERSHIP

Stephanie Haught Wade was named the new director of Historic Arkansas Museum (Little Rock, AR). Wade has been a historian with the Department of Arkansas Heritage since 2017, where she managed the Arkansas Historical Marker Program and was a member and administrator of the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commemoration Committee. She began work on April 5.

Coming Up in Affiliateland in April 2021

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Happy Earth Month everyone!

A museum visitor looks at a display of various people of color.

“The Bias Inside Us” features Spanish photographer Angélica Dass’ Humanae project, which reflects on the color of skin that challenges the concept of race. Photo by Science Museum of Minnesota.

IOWA
The Bias Inside Us exhibition from the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service opens at the National Czech and Slovak Museum and Library in Cedar Rapids, 4.17.

PUERTO RICO
Puerto Rican Affiliates, the Museo de Arte and Museo y Centro de Estudios Humanísticos, offer a workshop on The Conservation of Caribbean Culture: Training Future Conservators of Cultural Patrimony, 4.19-23.

MASSACHUSETTS
Teen filmmakers in the McAuliffe Center’s STEM mentorship program will present their ideas for addressing the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals as part of Framingham State University’s Science on State Street Fair: Planet Earth Edition, 4.20.

The Springfield Museums will feature Dr. Joyce Bedi, historian at the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the National Museum of American History, for a talk on Who Invented the Environment?, in Springfield, 4.22.

A scientist examines a skull.

Dr. Kari Bruwelheide measuring a cranium. Image Credit: Chip Clark, Smithsonian Institution.

OHIO
Dr. Kari Bruwelheide, forensic anthropologist at the National Museum of Natural History, will lead a virtual workshop for teachers as part of the Rethinking Jamestown professional development activities organized by the Springfield Museum of Art, in Springfield, 4.21-22.

NEW YORK
The Rockwell Museum will host a virtual dialogue with guest curator Emily Zilber and curator-in-charge Nora Atkinson about the Forces of Nature: Renwick Invitational 2020 exhibition at the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery as part of the Museum’s Environments Examined Spring 2021 lecture series, in Corning, 4.29.

Coming Up in Affiliateland in March 2020

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Spring is in full swing with so many great events nationwide. Happy Women’s History Month!

TEXAS
The John P. McGovern Museum of Health & Medical Science will feature a daily screening of the Smithsonian Channel film The Rise of the Killer Virus film as part of the Outbreak: Epidemics in a Connected World exhibition from the National Museum of Natural History, in Houston, 3.1-31.2020.

NORTH CAROLINA
The North Carolina Museum of History will screen the Smithsonian Channel film The Green Book: Guide to Freedom in Raleigh, 3.12.

National Museum of American History curator Barbara Clark Smith will give a talk on Reflections on American Democracy – in a Time of Political Uncertainty at the Greensboro History Museum, 3.18.

NEW MEXICO
The Hubbard Museum of the American West will screen the Smithsonian Channel film AERIAL AMERICA – The Wild West in Ruisdoso Downs, 3.14.

NATIONWIDE 
Twelve Affiliates will host Earth Optimism Teen Events in collaboration with the National Museum of Natural History on March 14. Participating Affiliates include the Anchorage Museum (Anchorage, AK); Buffalo Bill Center of the West (Cody, WY); Cape Fear Museum (Wilmington, NC); Frost Science Museum (Miami, FL); High Desert Museum (Bend, OR); Lowell National Historical Park (Lowell, MA); Mid-America Science Museum (Hot Springs, AR); New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science (Albuquerque, NM); Pinhead Institute (Telluride, CO); Science Museum Oklahoma (Oklahoma City, OK); U.S. Space and Rocket Center (Huntsville, AL); Western Science Center (Hemet, CA).

RHODE ISLAND
The Rhode Island Historical Society in partnership with the Community College of Rhode Island will host Dr. Ariana Curtis, curator at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, to give a lecture on Deliberate and Afraid of Nothing: Diversifying Women’s Representation, in Providence, 3.19.

ARIZONA
The Desert Caballeros Western Museum will host Art and Advertising in Buffalo Bill’s Wild West, a public lecture by Smithsonian scholar Dr. Michelle Delaney, in Wickenburg, 3.21.

Famous Pittsburgher Andy Warhol, one of the portraits soon to be on view at the Heinz History Center. By Hans Namuth, 1981. National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution: this acquisition was made possible by a generous contribution from the James Smithson Society

PENNSYLVANIA
The Heinz History Center will open Smithsonian’s Portraits of Pittsburgh: Works from the National Portrait Gallery, an exhibition of nearly 60 works of art on loan from the Smithsonian, in Pittsburgh, 3.21.

NEW YORK
Dr. Dwan Reece, curator at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, will speak on What it Means to be Free: The Woman’s Revolution in American Entertainment as part of the Rockwell Museum’s Advancing Women lecture series, in Corning, 3.17.

Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Garden will screen the Smithsonian Channel film Blondie’s New York in Staten Island, 3.28.

Jennifer Brundage, National Outreach Manager will join the director and staff of the Rockwell Museum in the Silo Breakdown: Internal Collaboration and Activating A Smithsonian Affiliation session at the Museum Association of New York conference in Albany, 3.29-31.

the Moon is rising in Affiliateland in April 2019

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Great events at Affiliates as spring starts blooming!

NORTH CAROLINA
The National Air and Space Museum has loaned three Apollo-related artifacts for the exhibition One Giant Leap: North Carolina and the Space Race opening at the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh, 4.5.

WASHINGTON
Destination Moon: The Apollo 11 Mission exhibition, organized by the National Air and Space Museum and the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, will open at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, 4.13.

ILLINOIS
As part of the Smithsonian Year of Music, the DuSable Museum of African American History will host A Celebration of Ella!!, a tribute event honoring the music and legacy of Ella Jenkins. At 94, Jenkins is one of the most revered singers and songwriters of the past century, with dozens of albums released through Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, in Chicago, 4.13.

PENNSYLVANIA
A protest armband from the 1960s, on loan from the National Museum of American History, will be part of the The Vietnam War: 1945-1975 exhibition at the Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh, 4.13.


NEW YORK
Katherine Ott, curator at the National Museum of American History, delivers the last talk of the Questioning Identity lecture series, Poking at Normal: Museums and the History of Real People  at the Rockwell Museum in Corning, 4.24.

WASHINGTON, D.C.
Teens from five Affiliate communities will visit Washington with museum staff and parents, to meet with Smithsonian Secretary David Skorton and participate in person in the final meeting of the Secretary’s Youth Advisory Council. Thanks to the Rockwell Museum, Fort Worth Museum of Science and History, National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, the Arab American National Museum, and the Upcountry History Museum, for helping us to include national teen voices in the work of the Smithsonian over the last two years!, in D.C.,  4.24.

IOWA
Smithsonian Affiliations Director Myriam Springuel and National Outreach Manager Aaron Glavas will participate in the affiliation announcement at new affiliate, the National Czech & Slovak Museum & Library in Cedar Rapids, 4.26.

MASSACHUSETTS
Astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory will present the April talk Moon Race: The U.S.-Soviet Competition to Put a Human on the Moon as part of the year-long Moon Landing in Context lecture series at Framingham State University in Framingham, 4.27.

 

Coming up in Affiliateland in March 2019

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Congratulations to Affiliates on these great programs!

NEBRASKA
The Durham Museum opens American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith, a SITES exhibition, on 3.2. National Museum of American History curator Dr. Barbara Clark Smith will deliver a public talk on her new book about resistance in revolutionary America in Omaha, 3.5.

RHODE ISLAND
National Museum of American History curator Dr. Claire Jerry will present a talk on Woman Suffrage with the Rhode Island Historical Society in Providence, 3.7.

NEW YORK
Mary Elliott, curator at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, will deliver the keynote address at the Long Island Museum‘s day-long symposium, Surviving Slavery on Long Island in Stony Brook, 3.9.

Diana N’Diaye of the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage will give a talk on the Will to Adorn: Stories of African American Dress and Identity project as part of the Questioning Identity lecture series at the Rockwell Museum in Corning, 3.27.

FLORIDA
The Mennello Museum of American Art opens the Art of the Airport Tower exhibition from the National Air and Space Museum, in Orlando, 3.14.

MASSACHUSETTS

photograph

President Kennedy with VonBraun

Dr. Michael Neufeld, curator at the National Air and Space Museum, will present a lecture titled Space Hero or Nazi Villain? The Life of Wernher von Braun as part of the Moon Landing in Context project at Framingham State University in Framingham, 3.28.