During WWII almost 120,000 Japanese Americans were uprooted from the West Coast regions that were deemed military exclusion zones, moved cities and states away, and controlled under severe restrictions. We can better understand the lives, experiences, and stories of these people by studying objec

What will the future of gender equity look like? The annual summit for 2021 will examine issues of gender, bias, and equity. History will be our guide as we unpack this question and envision our own answers to it.

We will host a panel discussion connecting stories of teenagers in the past fighting to address systemic injustice to those of the present. The 2020 annual summit will be centered on the case study of Claudette Colvin—a 15-year-old Black student in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955. Colvin refused to g

The American Party, also called the Know-Nothings, was a major national political force in the 1850s. It saw immigrants and Catholics as the greatest threat to self-government and to the nation. Arguing for rule by native-born Protestants, the Know-Nothings ran former President Millard Fillmore as t

A Lewis Hine silver print from about 1906–1918, this image of a young boy working at a loom in a cotton mill in Rhode Island is one in a series of photographs made by Hine for the National Child Labor Committee. The photographs document child labor throughout America in the early 20th century. As

The National Youth Summit brings middle and high school students together with scholars, teachers, policy experts, and activists in a national conversation about important events in America’s past that have relevance to the nation’s present and future. Mark your calendars for the next

In the fictional universe of George Lucas' Star Wars films, robots called droids (short for android) come in many shapes and serve many purposes. Two droids-R2-D2 and C-3PO-have won enormous popularity for their supporting roles in all six of the series. In the collections of the museum are costu

In the fictional universe of George Lucas' Star Wars films, robots called droids (short for android) come in many shapes and serve many purposes. Two droids--R2-D2 and C-3PO--have won enormous popularity for their supporting roles in all six of the series. In the collections of the museum are cos

Following independence, citizens of the new nation sought to forge their own identity and create a unique history. They established holidays such as the Fourth of July and later Thanksgiving Day and chronicled the story of America from the landing at Plymouth Rock through the Founding Fathers and

In 1776 Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence on this portable desk of his own design. It features a hinged writing board and a locking drawer for papers, pens, and inkwell. By the summer of 1776 members of the Second Continental Congress prepared to declare thei