As COVID-19 deaths spiked in 2020, Suzanne Firstenberg’s public art installation "In America: How could this happen…"
Museum Artifacts
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/1906%20Chinese%20Immigrant%E2%80%99s%20Lacquer%20Trunk.jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
9/3/2020
In 1906 Ng Shee Lee packed her clothes and belongings in this trunk and left China for America. It was a difficult trip. She slept next to the noisy engine room; arriving tired and sick in San Francisco she was met by the devastating 1906 earthquake. Ng Shee then made her way alone by train across C
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/981.jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
9/30/2008
During the early 1930s, the United States and the rest of the industrialized world experienced an economic depression. In 1934, the United States continued its movement toward removing its currency from the gold standard. It even became illegal to possess gold coins or gold-based currency until C
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/3359.jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
7/8/2009
In the 1950s, the station wagon became a staple of America's new suburban landscape and a ubiquitous extension of the suburban home. This car reveals how one family adopted a mobile, active lifestyle and how station wagons shaped family life.
Between the 1920s and 1940s, station wa
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/24%20game.jpeg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts
Date Posted:
1/2/2022
For decades, teachers drilled American school children using flash cards that gave simple arithmetic problems. The advent of inexpensive electronic calculators in the 1970s made it possible to do much routine arithmetic automatically. To teach school children the meaning of basic operations, new dev
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/Badge.jpg)
Grade Range:
5-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
9/2/2020
Demand for inexpensive, mass-produced women’s clothing spurred the rise of early garment factories. The ILGWU was formed in 1900 by bringing together several smaller local unions to fight to end sweatshop production, higher wages, and improve working conditions in the cities where the garment fact
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/5%20Dollars.jpeg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts
Date Posted:
8/12/2021
General Information: Commemorative coin made by the US Mint for Breast Cancer Awareness. Coin is gold with a pink hue. This is the first gold coin with a pink hue that the U.S. Mint has issued.This commemorative coin was minted by the United States Mint for a fundraising program for the Breast Cance
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/A%20Democratic%20Voter.jpg)
Grade Range:
6-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
9/3/2020
This undated black and white print depicts an Irish immigrant wearing a large campaign ribbon, tails, and striped breeches standing in front of two adjacent, flag draped campaign booths. One booth is occupied by a member of the “Loco Foco Committee,” and the other by a member of the “Tammany C
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/A%20U.S.%20Border%20Patrol%20official%20reviews%20a%20bracero%27s%20documents%20while%20others%20wait%20in%20line%20to%20be%20processed%20at%20the%20Hidalgo%20Processing%20Center%2C%20Texas..jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
9/3/2020
A U.S. Border Patrol official reviews a bracero's documents while others wait in line to be processed at the Hidalgo Processing Center, Texas.
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/1079.jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
10/27/2008
AbioCor Total Artificial Heart is the first electro-hydraulic heart implanted in a human. Approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration for clinical trails, the AbioCor was implanted in Robert Tools by cardiac surgeons Laman Gray and Robert Dowling on July 2, 2001, at Jewish Hospital
![](https://historyexplorer.si.edu/sites/default/files/256.jpg)
Grade Range:
K-12
Resource Type(s):
Artifacts, Primary Sources
Date Posted:
7/31/2008
Abraham Lincoln's interest in canal building, river commerce, and internal improvements not only drew him to the Whig and later Republican Party, but also led him to try his hand at designing a device for raising boats off sand bars. Undertaken while he was a 40-year-old lawyer in Illinois, Linco