Throughout the 1800s, homegrown American scientists and inventors were a source of pride for the fledgling republic, which was rapidly surpassing Great Britain and the rest of Europe as a hotbed of industrial activity. The period also coincided with the peak of the Romantic Period in art, music,

Our Democracy: A National Youth Summit civic education series Over the course of the 2022–2023 school year, we'll release classroom resources that address the driving question, "How do the stories we tell about our past shape our democracy?" Each case study uses museum objects and artifacts,

Monetary objects are powerful sources for exploring the past. The Value of Money connects American history to global histories of exchange, cultural interaction and expression, political change, and innovation through objects from the Smithsonian Institution’s National Numismatic Collection. T

The blue dress worn by Constance Wu in the film "Crazy Rich Asians." The film was the first Hollywood film to star a mostly East Asian cast since 1993's "The Joy Luck Club." The Marchesa dress is a Grecian-style dress with light blue tulle. Learn more about the artifact!

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

In the early 1960s, the Chicago firm of Playskool introduced this educational toy for children three to six years old, seeking to give them an early familiarity with numbers. It has two rows of relatively large rotating wooden rectangular blocks, each with a row of square rotating wooden blocks belo

Monetary objects are powerful sources for exploring the past. The Value of Money connects American history to global histories of exchange, cultural interaction and expression, political change, and innovation through objects from the Smithsonian Institution’s National Numismatic Collection. T

"One hundred years ago Marie Curie stood among the rose bushes, the press, and a crowd of White House guests, holding a golden key. The key opened a box that contained a gram of radium. Could it also unlock a cure to cancer? Women across America were led to believe as much, rising to the call sent

The inaugural address, delivered by the president of the United States after they take the oath of office, is one of the most anticipated events each election cycle. The newly elected president is not required to deliver an inaugural address, but following the example of George Washington, it has be

Despite disruption resulting from the suspension from Central High School and the later closure of all of Little Rock’s public schools to avoid integration, Minnijean Brown graduated on schedule in 1959 from New Lincoln School in New York City. New Lincoln School was a private, integrated school f