Museum Artifacts

The yo-yo maraca is a Puerto Rican novelty that unites both a spinning top and a musical instrument of native origin called a maraca. The name "yo-yo" is a misnomer, since the toy functions like a spinning top.

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History recently acquired at auction a rare 18th-century silver milk pot or creamer with engraved with symbols and an inscription that support the American colonists’ ongoing boycott of imported goods, especially tea, during the months following a

Speaking before hundreds of thousands of people can be nerve-racking. But you'd never guess that watching Naomi Wadler. At age 11, she rose to national prominence as a leader in the 2018 March for Our Lives to end gun violence. She remembers becoming politically aware at age 5 when George Zimmerman

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

Robert Capa (1913 - 1954) documented World War II from the bombing of London to fronts in North Africa, Italy, France, and Germany. He captured this arresting image of American troops landing at Omaha Beach on D-day, June 6, 1944. Capa was one of two magazine war correspondents all

The Nintendo Game Boy was released in 1989. It was a handheld video game console that combined aspects of Nintendos successful Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) television video game console with their earlier handheld electronic games marketed under the name “Game & Watch.”

This 40-saw cotton gin and the wooden gearing came from a farm formerly owned by the Augustus C. Smith family in Monroe County, G. The gin shed was built around 1840 and operated until approximately 1900. The gin stand was probably built in the decade following the Civil War; it bears no manufact

This Mercury fuming box for developing daguerreotypes is certainly among the earliest photographic equipment used in America, dating 1839-1840. Working closely with Dr. J.W. Draper in New York, Morse was instrumental in promoting photography in America, furthering experimentation, and producing e

This hand-modeled and molded, unglazed red earthenware pitcher honors Frederick Douglass, "Slave Orator/ United States Marshall, Recorder of Deeds D.C./ Diplomat."

This Smith & Wesson was found loaded at the Little Big Horn Battlefield in 1883. The Smith & Wesson Schofield revolver, .45 caliber, was manufactured from 1875 to 1878. The vast majority of the 9,000 guns went to the U.S. Army. Many saw service in the Indian Wars, though th