This rectangle of yellow cloth is small, only seven by nine inches, but it tells a much larger story. It begins in January 1917, when the National Woman's Party (NWP), led by Alice Paul, set up a silent picket outside the White House gates. After years of meetings with President Woodrow Wilson that had failed to produce results, suffragists decided to use the White House building as a stage to influence the man inside. Their goal was to "mak[e] it impossible for the President to enter or leave the White House without encountering a sentinel bearing some device pleading the suffrage cause," according to an article in the Washington Post on January 10, 1917. Women took turns standing with signs bearing slogans such as, "Mr. President, How Long Must Women Wait For Liberty?" and "Mr. President What Will You Do For Woman's Suffrage?" Their actions were covered extensively in newspapers across the country, sparking intense debate and garnering both support and derision from crowds that gathered to view the spectacle the women made. 

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As the protest continued, suffragists created a series of banners taunting "Kaiser Wilson." The banners compared the president to the German emperor and were intended to point out what the suffragists saw as hypocrisy on the part of President Wilson to support the cause of freedom in the First World War yet not support the freedom of women at home. The statements came across to some onlookers as disloyal and unpatriotic, particularly during a time of war.

On August 13, 1917, a crowd began to taunt and intimidate the suffragists. Some even began pelting the women with eggs and tomatoes. Soon the growing crowd graduated to tearing the banners from the suffragists' hands and ripping them up for souvenirs. Defiant, the picketers produced still more banners, only to have them taken from them as well. By the end of the day, the women had lost at least 20 banners and 15 color standards to an angry crowd that grew to over 3,000. Two men were arrested in the fracas, and the scrap of fabric from a banner reading "Kaiser Wilson Have You Forgotten…" was seized by District of Columbia police. It remained in their possession for 25 years, until the department gifted it to the National Woman's Party Headquarters.

Eventually, the fabric scrap made its way into the belongings of Alice Paul, the founder of the NWP and leader of the pickets, and was donated to the Smithsonian in 1987 by the Alice Paul Centennial Foundation as a tangible reminder of the hard-fought battle for woman's suffrage. But it is also part of an important story about the relationship between the people and the president.

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The women on the picket line were participating in an American tradition that had been in existence since the nation's founding: that of bringing the grievances of the citizenry directly to the chief executive at his home, the Executive Mansion (as the White House was then known). "The People's House," as the nickname suggests, was conceived as a building belonging to all citizens, akin to the democratic government itself, and contrasted with the untouchable palaces associated with a monarchy.

The White House building is both a means for and a symbol of the people's access to and participation in their governance. Throughout the 19th century, the American people had been accustomed to almost unlimited access to the house and to the president. Tourists wandered in and out of the building and petitioners waited for hours to bring their particular concern to the president. In 1882, as a plan to replace the deteriorating mansion was being floated in Congress, Senator Justin Morrill made objection on the grounds that the building itself was inextricably tied to the people's relationship to the president:

"'Our citizens have long been wont to visit the place, and there to take by the hand such Chief Magistrates as Jefferson, Adams, Jackson, Lincoln and Grant. They will not surrender their prescriptive privilege to visit the President here for the drowsy chance of finding him not at home after a ride of miles away out of town. He must be accessible to members of Congress, to the people, and to those who go on foot; and we have never had a President who even desired a royal residence, or one so far removed as to be unapproachable save with a coach and four. Our institutions are all thoroughly republican in theory, and it will be agreed they should remain so in practice.'" (S. Doc. No. 451, 49th Cong., 1st Sess. 1886)

Like so many Americans before them, the picketers came to the White House to use the voice American democracy had empowered them with. Unlike so many others, they found the best way for them to use that voice was outside the White House, not within. When the NWP took their conversation with President Wilson to the gates, they effectively established a new form of public interaction with the White House, a new way in which the people could access and "own" the "People's House," a tradition that would only become more popular over the next several decades, and which continues to this day.

Bethanee Bemis is a museum specialist in the Division of Political History. 

While processing a collection of Civil War scrapbooks, I was surprised to find imagery that reminded me of today's internet memes. A meme is a graphic often encountered on social media, combining an image and a comical phrase that is widely circulated and shared. Examples include success kid celebrating life's small victories and Grumpy Cat being, well, grumpy. The Civil War images I encountered were quick to consume and lightly lampooned current events.

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While today's memes and political cartoons spread through posts on Facebook and Twitter, these images spread through the mail. You didn't even have to open your mail to encounter it—the image was right on the envelope in many cases! Writing letters was one of the few ways to stay in touch with family members separated by war and the messages on the envelopes were an easy way to flaunt one's attitudes about the war.

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In moments of crisis, our first thoughts are usually to get in contact with the people we love. September 11, 2001, was a day when many people wanted to know that their loved ones were safe. At 9:37 a.m. the Pentagon was attacked by terrorists who crashed an airplane into the western side of the building. This was one of four airplanes that were hijacked that morning; two attacked New York City and a third crashed in Pennsylvania. Many people tried using the mobile phones that existed then, but few were successful. One couple at the Pentagon relied on pen and paper as the means to communicate with each other.

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Cedric Yeh, curator of our national September 11 collection, recently collected a handwritten letter from Daria "Chip" Gaillard to her husband, Franklin, both of whom worked at the Pentagon. A handwritten note might seem outdated to us in the digital era, but on that day a note provided peace of mind in the midst of chaos for this couple.

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Frank and Chip were both members of the Air Force and worked at the Pentagon. They worked in different parts of the building from where the attack occurred. Regardless, they evacuated and had a previous agreement that they would meet at their car in the parking lot if there were any emergency. Daria was the first to arrive at the car and wrote a note to Franklin saying "Frank—Sweetie I am okay. I'm w/ my office over by the Lyndon B. Johnson Memorial Sign. I'll stay there till you come. Love lots & lots, Chip."

Frank found the note and was able to locate his wife in the aftermath of the attack on the Pentagon. Not everyone was as fortunate as the Gaillards on September 11. Once the couple knew they were safe, they turned their attention and efforts to others. The child daycare center of the Pentagon was evacuating in the same area, and the Gaillards helped move the children to safety. Their focus on the safety of the children was one of many unselfish acts in the aftermath of the attacks that morning.

What makes this story so interesting is the handwritten note. Today in our digital culture we have a variety of ways to let people know that we are safe. Text messages, voicemail, and different forms of social media can be used to get the information out to loved ones. Facebook's Safety Check feature, for example, is a quick way for people who are located in a disaster area to tell their friends and family that they are safe. These all require a working cell phone network in order to be successful.

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In 2001 when these attacks happened, the cellular network was still growing and was not as robust as it is today. The people who had cellphones had trouble getting calls through, and the only other type of mobile communication were beepers, which have their own limitations.

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In the case of Franklin and Daria Gaillard, going low-tech served them well. In a moment when technology may have failed them, pen and paper did not. This letter is just one of the many objects that the museum has collected since 2001. To learn more about the objects collected, visit our online exhibition September 11th: Bearing Witness to History.

The museum will commemorate the 15th anniversary of September 11, 2001, with screenings of Stories in Fragments, in our Warner Brothers Theater. Check our calendar for screening times.

Matthew Wong completed an internship in the Division of Armed Forces History and is currently a master's candidate at American University.

As November 8 draws nearer, I have been thinking about what "electability" means for an American president. What makes someone look presidential, and how does the presidency change the look of the president? How can teachers help their students consider the nature of the American presidency this fall and throughout history? With this I mind, I considered the life, presidency, and changing appearance of Abraham Lincoln.

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During the election of 1860, Lincoln was praised for looking presidential. After Lincoln was photographed by Mathew Brady during his speech at the Cooper Institute in Manhattan, New York, Harper's Weekly made the photograph into a full-page portrait of Lincoln, who would soon receive his party's nomination. Lincoln was portrayed with a regal high collar, his hair smoothed and his features subtly refined. This "presidential" portrayal was so successful that Lincoln later said, "Brady and the Cooper Institute made me president."

In the spring of 1860, just before Lincoln was named the Republican nominee for president, Leonard Volk created a plaster cast of his face. Years later, John Hay, one of Lincoln's White House secretaries, commented that the cast shows, "a man of fifty-one, and young for his years. . . . It is a face full of life, of energy, of vivid aspiration."

But this image of Lincoln—of an intelligent and confident leader—only really reflects Lincoln as a candidate. Five years later, after becoming president and leading the Union though four years of the Civil War, Clark Mills created another cast of Lincoln's face. In the second cast, Lincoln looks drastically different. His full beard seems to cover a face that is far more gaunt. The bags under his eyes have become more pronounced, and the wrinkles on his forehead seem to indicate a permanently furrowed brow. As John Hay observed, his face is "so sad and peaceful in its infinite repose . . . a look as of one on whom sorrow and care had done their worst without victory is on all the features." The youthful energy and optimism that had once made Lincoln look "presidential" is no longer there.

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These two masks, snapshots of the beginning and the end of Lincoln's presidency, offer an amazing opportunity to think about the role of the president and the challenges that a president must face. Using Smithsonian's X 3D website you can view the life masks side-by-side in 3D as you explore these topics in class and have students consider the challenges of the Civil War and the difficult decisions that Lincoln faced while in office.

President Barack Obama's transformation over the past eight years offers similar opportunities for discussion of the role of the president. At the 2016 White House Correspondents' Dinner, Obama joked, "Eight years ago I was a young man, full of idealism and vigor . . . and look at me now! I am gray and grizzled…" His comments produced a chuckle from the crowd—they were funny because they are all too true.

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What challenges do presidents face during their time in office? What difficult decisions do presidents have to consider while in office? And what exactly do presidents do each day that takes such a toll? This activity from the museum's exhibition The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden (a title well illustrated by these portraits) takes a day in the life of President Harry Truman to help elementary and middle-school kids consider the "glorious burden" of being the president of the United States.

After examining Lincoln's life masks, considering Obama as a contemporary example, and exploring the American Presidency interactive, students will better understand the role of the president—and how the office of the presidency changes what it means to "look presidential."

Anali Alegria is an intern in the Office of Education and Public Engagement. She is an undergraduate at Harvard University studying history. She recommends the museum's e-book The Mind Behind the Mask: 3D Technology and the Portrayal of Abraham Lincoln, to learn more and find related activities.

As both a young woman casting my vote in my first presidential election and the founder of College Students for Bernie, I came to the museum interested in learning more about the history of politics and political engagement. What, for example, might my political involvement have looked like in other points in American history? Women have come a long way in the American political landscape. Although a gap remains, more and more women are running for office, holding important campaign roles, and casting their ballots. Parties recognize women as a significant voting bloc that needs to be appealed to.

For much of American history, however, women could not vote. The 19th Amendment, which extended the Constitutional right to vote to women, wasn't ratified until 1920, less than 100 years ago. Then how did these disenfranchised Americans influence political outcomes? What role did they play in key political decisions? Here are five ways I have found that women used their influence before the vote.

1. Persuading male voters 

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During the 1840s through to 1900, political rallies were also spaces where young men and women flirted and met their potential spouses. Politically inclined women charmed men to follow certain political leanings, especially men who were voting for the first time at age 21. In his new book The Virgin Vote, Smithsonian political history curator Jon Grinspan explains that women even "turned down marriage proposals specifically because of a young man's political affiliations." These actions pressured husbands and suitors to vote in favor of a woman's views.

2. Destructive crusades 

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Carry Nation (1846–1911) became a Temperance icon by smashing saloons, with her hatchet in one hand, and Bible in the other. Churches and theaters paid her to rail against alcohol, the "devil's water."

"Carry Nation used her place as a woman in Victorian society to spread her message. If a man smashed barrels of alcohol at the time, he would've been stabbed," Grinspan said during an interview. "Yet, when Carry did the same thing, they had to be gentlemen and would not hurt her." Although many of her contemporaries saw Carry Nation as a figure of ridicule, they also respected her integrity and passion for her beliefs. Most importantly, Nation used her radical approaches to launch the Temperance movement into the center of American life and politics.

3. Compelling Narrative

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Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin exposed the cruelty of slavery just nine years before the Civil War. This heart-wrenching piece gave slaves a powerful voice, humanizing their existence not simply as laborers but as complex individuals. Selling over 300,000 copies within three months of its publication, Uncle Tom's Cabin galvanized Northern hatred for slavery. Through her writing, Stowe helped popularize anti-slavery sentiments. 

4. Political organizing

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Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and other women organized the first women's rights conference in the United States called the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. With an attendance of 300 individuals, they finalized and signed the Declaration of Sentiments, a publication modeled after the Declaration of Independence demanding access to education and voting for women in America. Although there was a lot of backlash at the time, this bold Declaration established that women were capable of participating in the political process. Mott and Stanton specifically alluded to one of the nation's founding documents to show the consistency of a woman's right to vote with the fundamental philosophy of this country. The Seneca Falls Convention was the first step towards the passage of the 19th Amendment.

5. Transforming everyday objects into political vehicles

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In the early 1900s, women made politics immediate through everyday objects. For example, suffragists used wagons to disseminate information about women's rights across the country. Women, such as Lucy Stone, co-founder of the American Woman Suffrage Association, loaded these everyday wheeled vehicles with The Woman's Journal, a weekly pro-suffrage newspaper. Women also painted reasons why they should get the vote on the wagon itself. Above one of the wheels, it says, "90% of the teachers are women, this nation needs intelligent voters." Hence, women transformed this unique object into a publicity tool inside and out.

Conclusion

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Although these examples highlight opportunities afforded to white women, many of them women of privilege, women of color found some ways to participate in the political arena despite the discrimination they faced. Ida B. Wells is a notable example, a black woman who broke through all the barriers stacked up against her and made a remarkable impact on advancing civil rights in America. Born into an enslaved family, Wells devoted her life to anti-lynching crusades through journalism, boycotts, and legal channels. Her investigative journalism was essential to making the horrors of lynching known nationwide.

These lessons can inspire us today, especially in light of the decline of youth voting. We can look to our forebearers for examples in action. These women and others like them used all of the means they had before the vote—advocating, influencing, bearing witness—to make change. What could we accomplish if we used all of our means, including but not limited to voting, to make change today?

All images are items that can be viewed in the Smithsonian collections.

Elizabeth Siyuan Lee completed a James E. Webb internship in the Department of Education and Outreach as well as the curatorial Division of Political History. She is a senior at Middlebury College, majoring in Philosophy.

Giving in America is a permanent exhibit that looks at the historical role of philanthropy in shaping the United States. The exhibit showcases four major themes of American philanthropy centered on the questions of “Who Gives?” “Why Do We Give?” “What Do We Give?” and “How Do We Give?” and displays artifacts ranging from an alms box of the 1800s to a bucket used during the 2014-15 “ALS Ice Bucket Challenge” which went viral on social media. The exhibit features a section devoted to an annual topic and will open with a look at “Sustainability and the Environment."

Many writers have suggested that L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is an allegory for late 19th-century American Populism. (For a deep dive into that allegory and its criticisms, check out Peter Liebhold's recent post.) In a world where Dorothy's silver slippers on the yellow-brick road represent the debate between the gold and silver standards, and the Scarecrow and Tin Woodman are American farmers and factory workers, the Cowardly Lion is a single man—William Jennings Bryan, three-time presidential nominee, three-time loser, and the most spellbinding speaker of his day.

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Known for his speaking skill from the age of 12, Bryan delivered an oration at the 1896 Democratic National Convention that author Michael A. Cohen has called "the single most influential and electrifying campaign speech in American political history." Although Bryan had hoped to be his party's standard-bearer that year, his chances were slim until he delivered the final speech of the convention's platform debate. Newspapers across the country described it as "magnetic,""hypnotic,""remarkable," and "inspiring." His rousing conclusion about the silver standard and the common people brought the "shrieking" audience to its feet and gave the speech its name:

Having behind us the producing masses of this nation and the world, supported by the commercial interests, the laboring interests, and the toilers everywhere, we will answer their demand for a gold standard by saying to them: You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.

Rarely can a single speech, especially a campaign speech, be said to have produced a specific result but "Cross of Gold" unquestionably made Bryan, only 36 years old, the youngest major party nominee in American history. 

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So why was William Jennings Bryan the Cowardly Lion? Well, for starters, "Bryan" rhymes with "lion." More significantly, Bryan was physically imposing and his oratory powerful. In many ways he personified the Cowardly Lion's self-description: "I learned that if I roared very loudly every living thing was frightened and got out of my way." Why Bryan was "cowardly" is less obvious. By the time The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was published in 1900, Bryan was accused of downplaying free silver and focusing on his anti-imperialist opposition to the Spanish-American War, two actions seen by some as cowardly. Of course, the Cowardly Lion had never really been cowardly at all. Throughout their journeys he fought bravely to protect his friends, even postponing his own plans because Dorothy needed protection. Similarly, Bryan courageously stuck to positions he believed were in the best interest of his loyal supporters even though this approach led to his repetitive defeats.

Bryan's 1896 campaign was groundbreaking for more than his oratorical skill. One of the first candidates to appear widely on his own behalf, he was the original whistle-stop campaigner. Bryan traveled 18,000 miles by train to give over 600 speeches (36 in one day) to about five million people. In addition, because of improvements in technology, especially the invention of celluloid, thousands of new items were produced promoting Bryan and his Republican opponent William McKinley.  

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Finally, one can argue that Bryan's famous speech was a rhetorical role model for future young candidates who, with a single speech, overcame potentially career-ending attacks. In 1952, 39-year-old Richard Nixon, who would later be compared to the charlatan Wizard of Oz, used his "Checkers" speech to defend his campaign finances and save his job as Eisenhower's running mate. At the age of 43, John F. Kennedy put the "Catholic question" to rest with his 1960 address to the Houston Ministerial Association.

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William Jennings Bryan may have been, in the words of historian Michael Kazin, "the first celebrity politician," but Nixon and Kennedy succeeded where he failed. (Even the Cowardly Lion eventually became King of the Beasts.) Although he holds the record for winning the most Electoral College votes without ever winning an election, Bryan unintentionally fulfilled the wish his political opponent Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld made after hearing the "Cross of Gold"—"I had rather be able to make a speech like that than be president of the United States."

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Claire Jerry is a curator in the Division of Political History.

As we near Election Day, political cartoons are inescapable. Satirical cartoons continue a tradition of political printmaking that has been part of American political life since pre-Revolutionary times. Political prints and comics experienced a golden age in the late 19th century, during the era of the famed pens of Thomas Nast of Harpers Weekly and Joseph Keppler of Puck. Known for their symbolism, exaggerated caricatures, and satirical commentary, historical prints can provide the modern American with a rich glimpse into the nation's polarized past. This election season, it can be easy to overlook the fact that past presidential contests have been just as partisan and divided, and cartoons and caricatures can help to shed light on public opinion during these past contests.

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The Election of 1864

One contentious election of the 19th century that produced a significant output of political prints was the 1864 wartime contest between Republican incumbent Abraham Lincoln and his Northern Democratic opponent, George B. McClellan. Because of Lincoln's iconic status today, it is sometimes easy to forget that he had to run for re-election in the midst of the Civil War. In the North, the war was increasingly unpopular, as was Lincoln himself. "Old Abe" feared that he would lose his re-election—and lose badly.

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McClellan had been removed from command in November 1862, after refusing to pursue Lee's army following the Union victory at Antietam. In 1864 he was selected as the Democratic candidate for president. The Northern Democratic Party was controlled by a movement within the party known as the Peace Democrats—nicknamed "Copperheads" by Republicans, who compared them to traitorous serpents. These anti-war Democrats favored a cease of hostilities with the Confederacy. McClellan himself identified with the War Democrats, who wished to continue the conflict in order to restore the Union, although without the abolition of slavery. Political images were employed by both Republicans and Democrats to weaken their opponent's positions on the war and abolition.

The Cartoons of 1864

Editorial cartoons became extremely popular in the months leading up to the 1864 election. Included in weekly periodicals and distributed by political activists, these ephemeral prints were intended to be glanced at and shared, but ultimately discarded. Artists and publishers capitalized on the viciousness of the presidential race, choosing to portray candidates in a negative light. Some printers, in an effort to attract as many buyers as possible, would play both sides of the field, producing scathing images of both Lincoln and McClellan.

To draw voters away from Lincoln, Democratic promoters played up contemporary racist fears of Northern whites, arguing that the abolition of Southern slaves would result in nationwide social upheaval. They pushed groundless arguments that Lincoln was a supporter of "miscegenation"—the derogatory term at the time used to describe interracial mixing—believing that such rumors would isolate Lincoln from biased Northerners. The World, a Democratic newspaper in New York, had openly attacked Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. In 1864 The World published a series of political prints depicting interracial couples and families, arguing that the re-election of Lincoln and the feared racial mixing would go hand-in-hand.

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Anti-Copperhead cartoons viciously attacked McClellan, or "Little Mac," criticizing his war record and blaming the prolonged length of the conflict on his overly-cautious military decisions. They also tried to instill a patriotic fervor within viewers, advocating for the need of the reservation of the Union and condemning the prospect that the thousands of perished Union soldiers would die in vain.

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The Outcome

Of course, Lincoln did win his bid for re-election in 1864, running on the ticket of the National Union Party, which attracted votes from both Republicans and pro-Union Democrats. General William T. Sherman's capture of Atlanta in July 1864 and sharp divisions between the War and Peace Democrats helped ensure the incumbent's victory. Lincoln's second inauguration took place on March 4, 1865. A month later, Lee surrendered his Army of Virginia to General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, on April 9. Lincoln was assassinated five days later. While Lincoln was from then on imagined as a martyr for the nation, McClellan's wartime reputation shadowed him for the rest of his life and even after his death.

This final, unattributed anti-McClellan cartoon depicts the disgraced general attempting to dig his way into the White House—a reference to his cautious demeanor and predisposition to construct trenches rather than engage in necessary offensives. He is blocked by a ghostly apparition of Liberty and a legion of skeletal Union soldiers who had fallen in battle. Liberty admonishes him for allowing "these my Children to die in the swamp and on the Battlefield." For this misdeed, she instructs him to instead dig his own grave and be forgotten.

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The lithographic prints featured in this blog all belong to the Harry T. Peters "America on Stone" Collection.

Jacob Kowall is currently an undergraduate student at the College of Wooster in Wooster, Ohio. He completed an internship in the Department of Home and Community Life under curator Debbie Schaefer-Jacobs and is assisting in the online publication of the Harry T. Peters "America on Stone" Civil War prints.

We often remember the civil rights movement as a few iconic events that took place at famous landmarks—the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the National Mall. Programming intern Alex Kamins learned that it took place all over the country, including a small roadside eatery in the middle of Maryland.

I recently drove about 40 miles to go to a diner. There's nothing wrong with the diners closer to home here in Washington, D.C., but I knew the Double T Diner in Catonsville, Maryland, had a story to tell—along with some solid diner fare.

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Located on Route 40, once the main connection between Washington, D.C., and New York, the Double T offers a retro setting designed to evoke the 1950s, complete with neon colors, chrome design, and a jukebox on every table. The clientele tends to be locals looking for a bite to eat and perhaps a friendly chat. I managed to go the day before the Fourth of July and it was packed. People were lining up in droves in order to get a table. As I was by myself, I managed to sneak in under the radar and find a spot at the counter.

As popular as it is, I don't think most of the people squeezing into the Double T know that 55 years ago, this diner refused to serve African American patrons. Back in 1961, a demonstration took place there in which students took days off from classes, risked their lives, and stood outside and picketed—probably feeling fear and apprehension every minute they were there. They were fighting for one simple cause: that African Americans would be treated as equals and that the diner would drop its Jim Crow-era segregationist policy.

With the election of John F. Kennedy as president in 1960, many people (particularly African Americans) hoped that he might lead the country away from segregation. But progress was slow and Kennedy's focus seemed to be on the Soviet Union and the threat of communism spreading around the globe.

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However, a few events in the first couple years of his term forced him to acknowledge that something had to be done about civil rights in America. Starting in 1960, the United States received an increase in diplomatic representatives from Africa. Multiple African diplomats, in particular William Fitzjohn of Sierra Leone and Adam Malik Sow of Chad, were harassed and beaten at a number of establishments as they made their way along Route 40 from Washington, D.C., to the United Nations headquarters in New York. In an August 1960 article for the Washington Post titled "D.C. is a Hardship Post for Negro Diplomats," reporter Milton Viorst was able to convey to his readers the state of affairs for these diplomats as they made their way to D.C.: "[The diplomat] has learned to live in 'colored' hotels, eat in 'colored' restaurants, and spend his evenings in 'colored' movies. When asked how he accepts it, he shrugs and calls it a hazard of his profession."

While Kennedy publicly apologized to Fitzjohn and Sow for what happened, he saw these incidents as a thorn in his side in terms of his overall plan for the time he was in office. According to Nick Bryant'sThe Bystander: John F. Kennedy and the Struggle for Black Equality, he even chastised the African diplomats (not directly, but in a private phone call with one of his advisors) for taking Route 40 saying, "Can't you tell those African ambassadors not to drive on Route 40? It's a hell of a road—I used to drive it years ago, but why would anyone want to drive it today when you can fly? Tell these ambassadors I wouldn't think of driving from New York to Washington. Tell them to fly!"

Kennedy created the Special Protocol Service Section at the State Department and installed Pedro Sanjuan as its head. Sanjuan personally visited every establishment along Route 40 and pleaded with them to cease segregation, presenting himself as representing the president, complete with a letter from Kennedy. As a result of his visits, more than half of the 78 restaurants along Route 40 voluntarily complied with his request.

According to Raymond Arsenault's Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice, Sanjuan plead his case to Maryland lawmakers by saying, "when an American citizen humiliates a foreign representative or another American citizen for racial reasons, the results can be just as damaging to his country as the passing of secret information to the enemy." Unfortunately for Kennedy, he didn't know this twist was coming. According to Nicholas Murray Vachon's The Junction: The Cold War, Civil Rights, and the African Diplomats of Maryland's Route 40, Kennedy aide Harris Wofford remembers that when it came to civil rights, the president made decisions "hurriedly, at the last minute, in response to Southern political pressures without careful consideration of an overall strategy." He felt as though his involvement in this crisis would make America look weak in the eyes of the rest of the world and that the Soviet Union would take advantage of the situation, which they eventually did. Bryant describes in The Bystander how Soviet officials in New York "offered to sign leases on behalf of at least three United Nations-based African diplomats who had been rebuffed by white landlords."

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Around this time, African American students saw a strategic opportunity to increase the visibility of the movement. Vachon describes how the students donned dashikis, robes, and fake accents and proceeded to go to a number of establishments along Route 40. The response they received was mixed but often cordial. One place demanded to see their credentials while others either served them in another room or treated them as regular customers.

Bryant continues his narrative by describing how Sanjuan, frustrated that "the administration was unwilling to enact new legislation," began to turn to civil rights groups such as CORE to organize and picket the remaining segregated institutions along Route 40. CORE (short for the Congress of Racial Equality) decided to initiate a Freedom Motorcade that was to be scheduled for November 11, but just a few days before it was to take place, "the majority of restaurant owners along U.S. #40 agreed to desegregate," as stated on CORE's protest flyer "End Racial Discrimination along U.S. 40 between the Delaware Memorial Bridge and Baltimore."

However, some institutions refused to comply and CORE printed up flyers for anyone who was interested. The call on those flyers was to "Help us finish the job!" and the aim was to orchestrate a number of sit-ins in the segregated establishments. On the flyers, the demonstrators outlined a step-by-step process of what would happen to the volunteers. They would be verbally abused and under the constant threat of violence. Some were arrested, but the focal point (as outlined in the flyer) was to "be courteous and stay non-violent throughout, no matter what the provocation."

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Every day for the next few months, 300 to 400 students made their way into the remaining segregated establishments and would remain there until they were read the trespass law by the owner in the presence of police, as was required by Maryland law. These sit-ins were so successful that by June 1962, all of establishments along Route 40 were completely desegregated thanks to the Public Accommodations Law passed by the Baltimore City Council.

As for the Double T Diner…

Though I was at the diner only long enough to enjoy a burger and fries, it seemed almost surreal to picture what happened there 55 years ago. Both black and white students, as well as ordinary volunteers and prominent civil rights activists, sat at this very counter silently protesting the treatment of African Americans. I kept turning my head in many directions, looking for any glimpse of the dramatic events of the past. Diners were talking about their plans for the Fourth of July and the score of the previous night's Orioles game, and were unlikely to be thinking about the events of the past. There's no plaque or newspaper article taped to the wall to inform diners about what happened here.

As I left the diner, I kept thinking to myself how, even though we tend to think of the civil rights movement as a few seminal events, the reality was it took place all over the country, where thousands of people risked their lives every day for a more humane nation. We can still think about the history surrounding a location even as we enjoy a cheeseburger.

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Alex Kamins completed a programming internship working with the Office of Programs and Strategic Initiatives. He is a graduate student at New York University's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and is set to graduate next May.

I was exploring storage one day with Larry Bird, emeritus curator in the museum's Division of Political History, when a very curious self-portrait of Thomas Nast caught my eye. Thomas Nast was a contributor to the Harper's Weekly magazine and is most famous for popularizing the use of the donkey and the elephant to represent the Democratic and Republican parties, respectively. Nast was also a close friend of President Ulysses S. Grant. Nast looks dejected and defeated; the overall tone of the illustration was somber, in gloomy shades of grey.

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What explains Nast's dour expression? Bird explained that Nast painted it after he fell victim to a cruel Ponzi scheme, perpetrated by Ferdinand Ward, a young and ambitious financier. In 1880 Ward established a brokerage firm that led to the ruin of many investors, and he went on to serve nearly seven years in prison for fraud. However, in a strange twist of fate, the loss for Nast and the other investors was a gain for the United States National Museum in Washington, D.C., from which many Smithsonian contemporary museums have received their collections.

How did Nast and the other investors get duped by Ward? Ward like many schemers of the 19th century, made his banking business seem reputable by taking on a partner with name recognition: Ulysses Simpson "Buck" Grant, the eldest son of President Grant. Ward called the firm "Grant and Ward." Nast was not the only famous American conned into this scheme. Looking through the Division of Political History files, I learned that President Grant also invested his life savings with Ward.

When Ward attempted to borrow more money from the Marine National Bank, the bank's president wrote to President Grant, asking about the firm. President Grant replied, "I think the investments are safe, and I am willing that Mr. Ward should derive what profit he can for the firm that the use of my name and influence may bring."

In 1884 the former president learned that the firm was not financially stable. In an attempt to help save his son's firm, he secured a personal loan from William Vanderbilt, the richest man in the world at the time and the president of the New York Central Railroad. The loan of $150,000 was a personal favor. Vanderbilt exclaimed, "What I've heard about that firm would not justify me in lending it a dime." However, Vanderbilt gave Grant the money against his better judgment, saying, "to you — to General Grant — I'm making this loan."

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By 1884 President Grant, Nast, and the rest of the investors were completely broke. The day after President Grant gave the Vanderbilt loan to the company, Ward and the money disappeared. Unfortunately, President Grant still needed to repay Vanderbilt. To settle the debt, President Grant paid Vanderbilt with Civil War memorabilia and items he received on his 1877–1879 World Tour.

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After Grant's death in 1885, Vanderbilt gave the artifacts back to his widow, Julia Dent Grant, strictly on the condition that they be donated to the National Museum, which had opened to the public in October 1881. In addition to displays of geology, natural history, and musical instruments, the National Museum, housed in the Arts and Industries Building on the National Mall, was also home to the personal effects of President George Washington. On February 3, 1885, a resolution was adopted by Congress to accept the gift. It became law on August 6, 1886. The group of objects became known as the Grant-Vanderbilt Collection here at the Smithsonian. The collection includes Grant's gifts from Japan and a ceremonial cane made out of scraps from the famous Civil War ironclad, theMerrimac. This massive donation helped establish the National Museum as a place for people to donate their historical objects.

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As for Nast, he lost most of his fortune in this scheme. Nast attempted to regain some of his fortune by going on lecturing tours in 1884 and 1887, and he also took commissions on paintings.

Overall, I found it incredibly fascinating that the items that are preserved at the Smithsonian can lead to amazing stories and that these objects are more than just objects since they carry so much history with them. It is also interesting to see how a historic loss turned into one of the National Museum's greatest gains.

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Paul Esposito completed an internship in the Division of Political History.

The 2016 presidential election brought renewed discussion about the way Americans vote for presidential electors, those who will then cast ballots for president. But few Electoral College controversies can top the once-in-a-lifetime New York State electors meeting of January 1893, chaired by piano manufacturer William Steinway. 

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William Steinway wrote in his diary on January 9, 1893, that it was "intensely cold" and his knee "hurts me badly" due to a terrible attack of gout as he boarded a New York City train for the state capital, Albany. However, the pain wasn't going to stop Steinway from chairing the meeting of New York State's presidential electors, who would cast votes for his longtime friend and 1892 Democratic presidential winner, Grover Cleveland.

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Steinway had no way of knowing that some of New York's Democratic leaders would carry out secret plans to hijack the electors meeting in order to push through an endorsement of their eventually successful U.S. Senate candidate, Edward J. Murphy Jr. The New York Times wrote that the meeting turned into a farce, and editorialized, "If the ridiculous institution of the Electoral College had been abolished this disreputable appendix to it would have been avoided."

Today, the U.S. system of voting for electors—who then cast ballots for president and vice president in separate state meetings—is piquing public interest because opponents question whether it is fair for candidates to win the popular vote but lose the election. The electors chosen in each state form the Electoral College. There are 538 electors in the 50 states and the District of Columbia, with 270 electoral votes needed to elect a president and vice president.

In 2016 Democrat Hillary Clinton became the fifth presidential candidate to win the popular vote but lose in the Electoral College. She received more votes than Republican Donald Trump but lost in the Electoral College, 304–227. (Seven electors, two pledged to Trump and five pledged to Clinton, voted for someone else.)

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On January 20, when he delivers the 58th inaugural address, Donald Trump will join a long line of orators inspired by George Washington. Taking the oath of office is the only constitutionally mandated event of the day, but every president has recognized that an inaugural address is an important part of the national celebration.

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Presidents look to previous speakers for role models. Bill Clinton read Abraham Lincoln's second, Franklin Roosevelt's first, and John Kennedy's inaugurals; Donald Trump has said he is looking to the speeches of Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. But the collection of inaugural addresses is more than just a series of individual speeches. Rhetorical scholars Karlyn Kohrs Campbell and Kathleen Hall Jamieson argue that each inaugural address is not simply one stage in the ritual of transition. It is also part of a genre which has aspects understood by both speakers and audiences. Knowing the characteristics of this genre identified by Campbell and Jamieson and exploring some examples can help listeners better understand these speeches in which presidents first demonstrate their worthiness for the job that started when they took the oath.

Unification of the Audience: Inaugurations serve as the transition point between the competition of a campaign and the needs of an administration beginning to govern. For the audience to properly fulfill their role as witnesses to this investiture of power, they must be unified and reconstituted as "we the people." Therefore, according to political scientist Lee Sigelman, these speeches are "literally brimming with verbal tokens of unity." There are references to our founders, our nation, and the future we face. Dwight Eisenhower spoke of the purposes "to which we, as a people, are pledged" (second inaugural) and Benjamin Harrison called his inaugural moment a "mutual covenant" between himself and the people. Thomas Jefferson in his first inaugural may have been the most explicit: "We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all Republicans, we are all Federalists."

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Reaffirmation of national values: New presidents must also establish their qualifications for the office by demonstrating they understand and will preserve the communal values that are key to what Bill Clinton in his first inaugural called "the very idea of America." These traditional values are proclaimed in words like freedom, liberty, democracy, faith, courage, destiny, etc. Speakers honor the "venerated example" of previous presidents (James Monroe, first inaugural) by quoting from their inaugurals and promising to promote policies that build on the principles of the past.

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Setting forth political principles: Unlike many other presidential addresses, most notably the State of the Union, the inaugural is not a speech intended to advocate specific legislation. Instead, inaugurals present the more general philosophies that will guide administrations. Particular policies are offered, not for action, but to demonstrate presidents' commitment to the democratic system. James Polk promoted his "plain and frugal" economic plans because a national debt "is incompatible with the ends for which our republican Government was instituted." Herbert Hoover said that the policies he listed would be tested against the "ideals and aspirations of America." Even William Howard Taft, whose inaugural was among the most policy specific, framed his ideas with respect to the "proper" role of the federal government "in what it can and ought to accomplish for its people."

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Enacting the presidential role: Candidates give speeches that are highly partisan and self-promoting, but audiences have different expectations when the campaign ends and governing begins. Campbell and Jamieson note that new presidents must demonstrate they "can lead the nation within the constitutionally established limits of executive power." In his first inaugural, Franklin Roosevelt acknowledged the constraints on his "leadership of frankness and vigor" and pledged to rely on his "constitutional duty" to work with Congress. Campbell and Jamieson add that these speeches must also enact the "public, symbolic role of president of all the people" by revealing traits such as humility and reliance on a higher power. A typical example is Warren Harding's conclusion: "I accept my part with single-mindedness of purpose and humility of spirit, and implore the favor and guidance of God in His Heaven. With these I am unafraid, and confidently face the future."

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Fulfilling ceremonial expectations: Because of the circumstances surrounding them, inaugural addresses carry the stylistic expectations of ceremonial speaking (what Aristotle called epideictic rhetoric). Such speeches strive to reach beyond the immediate situation to evoke timeless themes using memorable phrases. Kennedy's "ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country" challenges Americans across the decades. The closing of Lincoln's second inaugural, possibly the most eloquent section in inaugural history, is appropriate to the end of any conflict: "With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations."

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Not all inaugural addresses achieve greatness—and some are, frankly, bad. But each of them to date has tried to do these five things audiences expect, thereby helping to sustain what FDR in his second inaugural called "our covenant with ourselves."

Claire Jerry is a curator in the Division of Political History. She has also blogged about a rousing speech by William Jennings Bryan. For further reading, the author recommends Presidents Creating the Presidency: Deeds Done in Words by Karlyn Kohrs Campbell and Kathleen Hall Jamieson.

As the fanfare leading up to the 2017 inauguration swirls around the Smithsonian and Washington, D.C., at large, I cannot help but think about watching events such as these portrayed on television and in movies. Depictions of the presidency and the White House in popular culture are strong influences on the way Americans imagine their government. Such scenes also reflect the views of Americans across time. While The West Wing portrayed Washington, D.C., as a complicated but generally impactful place to work, other elements of popular culture depict a very different White House. In the film Air Force One the president is a heroic action hero. In television's Scandal, President Fitzgerald "Fitz" Grant is humanized and often conflicted when faced with personal decisions. And President Selina Meyer on HBO’s Veep is depicted as a bumbling narcissist. Because of the influence of television and film on American life (and vice versa), it is important for the Smithsonian to collect objects representing television and movie presidents alongside real American presidential objects (such as those in the exhibition The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden.)

Working in the museum's Division of Culture and the Arts, it feels like my work follows me everywhere. Recently, on my commute to work one morning, I was listening to The West Wing Weekly. The podcast discusses every episode of the television show The West Wing. While discussing the Christmas decorations in "Noël" (Season 2, Episode 10), Ellen Totleben, set decorator on The West Wing, mentioned the fishbowl that sits on the desk of Press Secretary C. J. Cregg. Joshua Malina, one of the podcast’s hosts as well as an actor on The West Wing, commented that there should be a fish tank at the Smithsonian with all of the pieces from the goldfish bowl. Well, there is! (Sort of.)

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In 2000 Aaron Sorkin, creator and executive producer of The West Wing, donated several objects from the hit show to the museum—including Gail's fishbowl. Gail, the goldfish given to C. J. Cregg by White House reporter Danny Concannon, lived in a fishbowl on Cregg's desk in the White House. In every episode, Gail's fishbowl was subtly decorated to reflect a plot storyline. In episode 10 of the first season, "In Excelsis Deo," there is a tiny Christmas tree inside the fishbowl, as well as an artificial poinsettia plant on top of the bowl. These decorations, along with the fishbowl and its white gravel, are in the Entertainment Collection in the Division of Culture and the Arts. (Gail the goldfish did not make the journey to the museum.)

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While The West Wing was successful with television viewers when it aired from 1999 to 2006, I did not actually watch the show until I moved to Washington, D.C., three years ago. Several friends suggested it was a fun show to watch while living and working in the place it depicted. For those of you who have yet to watch the series, The West Wing follows (fictional) President Josiah "Jed" Bartlet and his staff in the West Wing of the White House through the legislative and political issues across Bartlet's (spoilers) two terms in office. While the show went off the air over a decade ago, it does not feel dated (with the exception of giant cell phones, pagers, and a fledgling Internet) due to its coverage of political issues still in the news today, such as terrorism, trade negotiations, and LGBTQ rights.

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If you are missing the constant news coverage from last year's election and need your political fix, television and film are great ways to immerse yourself in different fictional versions of the White House. The West Wing is one viewing option, among many, that you can use to surround yourself with depictions of Washington, D.C. And make sure to keep an eye out for Gail and the ever-changing fishbowl decorations! While not every fishbowl decoration is here at the Smithsonian, we are happy to have this one as a representation of the many presidential depictions in American popular culture.

Hanna BredenbeckCorp is a project assistant in the Division of Culture and the Arts.

Seventy-five years ago, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066. While the order avoided naming any particular ethnic group, the president and his advisers intended it to target Japanese Americans. Military officials "evacuated" Americans of Japanese ancestry to "relocation centers." 120,000 men, women, and children had just days to divest themselves of all they owned—their homes, farms, and businesses—and take only what they could carry to far-flung prison camps from Arkansas to California. For years afterward, people like my grandmother Bette Takei (née Sato), were forced to live behind barbed wire, under the gaze of armed guards.

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Grandma was 23 years old. She'd grown up in Walnut Grove, a small rural Japantown in California, with aspirations of becoming a fashion designer. She attended junior college in Sacramento, but her ambitions were thwarted when she was forced into the euphemistically named Tule Lake War Relocation Center. Armed guards patrolled this prison camp, which was completely enclosed by barbed-wire fences. Dust and fine grit constantly blew through the walls of the hastily constructed barracks, and—in a shock to her modesty—the toilets and shower stalls in the communal latrines stretched in long, open rows with no dividers.

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She briefly escaped by marrying my grandfather Kuichi "Jim" Takei, a 30-year-old sergeant who had been drafted into the U.S. Army before Pearl Harbor and—despite being reclassified as an "enemy" for his Japanese ancestry—instructed to remain in the service. They had met only once before the war, but Bette began a correspondence with Kuichi. When she suggested marriage in mid-1943, he was surprised and flattered—and accepted her proposal. Kuichi was stationed at an army base in Mississippi, and Bette obtained authorization to leave the prison camp to get married to Kuichi there. For several months, they lived together in a cramped house with multiple other newlywed military couples. But at the end of the year, he was ordered to deploy to Europe in a racially segregated artillery unit. He took with him a thousand-stitch belt, or senninbari, that his mother had sewn him for good luck, and which is now part of the Smithsonian's collection. His battalion was among those that liberated survivors of the Nazi death camp at Dachau.

After Kuichi deployed, Bette returned to be incarcerated with her parents and siblings, who had by then been transferred to another prison camp in Colorado. So, while Kuichi fought for the allies in Europe, my grandmother Bette waited for him in an American version of a concentration camp. (Note: Language matters when talking about the experiences of Japanese American during World War II. The author prefers to use the phrase "concentration camp" here. Learn more about the language of incarceration in our online exhibition.)

The War Department justified the action as being a "military necessity." These officials claimed that Japanese Americans had deliberately settled "adjacent to strategic points" and were using radios to send covert signals to Japanese navy ships. They continued making these claims even after the FBI, FCC, and Office of Naval Intelligence investigated and debunked them. A bipartisan federal commission concluded years later that the prison camps had no military purpose and had been borne of "race prejudice, war hysteria and a failure of political leadership."

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Executive Order 9066 was not just a product of immediate wartime panic. It was also enabled by years of virulent, systematic racism against Asian Americans. As a child, my grandmother attended racially segregated schools because officials prohibited children of Japanese descent from attending the same schools as white children. For decades, federal officials had targeted Chinese and Japanese immigrants with discriminatory immigration controls and conducted surveillance of their communities. And many newspapers encouraged anti-Japanese sentiment by falsely portraying these immigrants as dangerous criminals.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, people with high positions in government swiftly acted on these sentiments. This included Lt. General John L. DeWitt, who famously declared that "a Jap's a Jap" regardless of U.S. citizenship, and Colonel Karl Bendetsen, who insisted along with DeWitt that the absence of evidence against Japanese Americans was reason to suspect them of wrongdoing: "The very fact that no sabotage has taken place to date is a disturbing and confirming indication that such action will be taken." These individuals used their positions to convince the president and the War Department to begin a mass roundup of Japanese American communities. When cases challenging the roundup and incarceration finally reached the U.S. Supreme Court, the high court relied on DeWitt's and Bendetsen's lies and misinformation to uphold the government's actions as constitutional.

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Years later, that Supreme Court decision, Korematsu v. United States, came to be almost universally regarded as a stain on American jurisprudence, and in 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed legislation apologizing for and granting reparations to the survivors of the World War II incarceration. The damage, however, had been done. As President George H.W. Bush wrote in his apology letter to my grandparents, "We can never fully right the wrongs of the past. But we can take a clear stand for justice."

That letter hangs on the wall of my parents' house. It reminds us that our freedoms are fragile.

Carl Takei is a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union. His grandparents were imprisoned in the Japanese American Incarceration camps.

As the museum's social media manager, I get to see many snapshots our visitors share on social media while they're here. Frequently appearing in photos is our statue of George Washington by Horatio Greenough. Visitors often share their photos of the toga-wearing statue with a sense of awe—and occasionally they poke a bit of a fun at George. "Great abs on this guy!"

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When we open our new floor, centered on the theme "The Nation We Build Together," I think visitors will find something new in Washington's statue, positioned at the entrance to the new space. "This nation isn't going to build itself," Washington seems to hint, offering his sword to the viewer. "Better start working together on this!" What a monumental task and a fitting way to orient visitors as they enter the new wing.

I chatted with the museum's Elizabeth MacMillan Director John Gray to find out what excites him most as we prepare to open "The Nation We Build Together" on June 28, 2017.

One of the first things visitors see in the new wing will be a statue of George Washington. What will that Washington statue communicate to our visitors as the "landmark" or "gateway" object for that space?

George Washington's most extraordinary act, one of the most profound acts in our history, was to give power back to the people. That statue is a symbol of that action. The statue portrays Washington extending his arm and offering back his sword—which represents power—to the nation. As visitors enter the second floor and see into "The Nation We Build Together," that giant statue prepares them for the experience of the whole floor.

The museum's new floor unites several different exhibitions under the unified theme of "The Nation We Build Together." Can you talk about what that theme means to you?

We really want our visitors to have the opportunity to explore the largest ideals and ideas in America. And the name, "The Nation We Build Together," says we are a people and a nation that works collectively through our democracy to forge our nation. This is an ongoing and complicated process—but we are always working toward our national motto: E Pluribus Unum (Out of Many, One). It is so important that, as Americans, we view ourselves as part of the body of America, working together, being together, and building this nation together.

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We know "The Nation We Build Together" has been in development for many years. But why is that theme an important one to explore in 2017?

"The Nation We Build Together" is an important theme that resonates across our history, one that's fundamental to understanding America, ourselves, and the larger political process—not limited to party politics, but how we learn, make, and determine how we are governed together.

That said, there's never a better time than the present to understand America. Every election turns out to be different than some people expected. That was true last year, four years ago, four years before that, all the way back to our founding—it's the nature of democracy as we practice it in America! Our new exhibition American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith will help our visitors understand and contextualize the inherent changes we see over time in America. It's both reassuring and inspirational.

What are we trying to inspire visitors to think or do differently after visiting "The Nation We Build Together"?

The whole floor is about inspiring engagement—understanding that you are part of the process in a bigger way. Many Voices, One Nation inspires all of us to participate in building American communities—really build them! American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith reminds all of us that we must play an active role in our democracy to keep our nation vital and responsive. And Religion in Early America helps us understand the historical underpinnings of how we practice and celebrate the diversity of religious experience in America.

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A large Statue of Liberty made of LEGO bricks has appeared in our Constitution Avenue lobby. Can you talk about why Lady Liberty is an important image in the museum right now and what that means to you?

Look at the icons that we've taken from American history and championed. We have the Star-Spangled Banner on display here at the center of the building—and we also have President Lincoln's hat. Each one helps us recognize something we know about or identify within American history—and Lady Liberty is one of those powerful symbols. The image of the Statue of Liberty is inspiring to so many of us. She embodies all of the complicated ideas that form our American history and drive our nation's future.

We try to always have a major object in the museum's Constitution Ave. lobby to send a message about what is happening in the rest of the building and that's what the Statue of Liberty does for us. For many visitors, she's a great photo opportunity and we've seen lots of selfies snapped there. But it's also a spot where people stop to discuss: What does that symbol mean to you? That is an essential discussion we want to see happening in our museum.

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Before we get into specific exhibitions, is there a favorite spot in "The Nation We Build Together" that you want to call out in particular for our visitors?

Well I love that we're going to display Thomas Jefferson's desk and a church bell made by Paul Revere. But I'm also very excited about how we've re-positioned the Greensboro lunch counter in Unity Square. We've given it its own powerful and poignant installation where it will be the center for programs that get visitors talking about America's freedoms both in real life and symbolically. It's called American Experiments and it's going to be a great way to explore, through civic discourse, how we constantly pursue and ensure our freedoms.

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Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith is one of the exhibitions opening in the Linda and Pete Claussen Hall of American Democracy. What do you hope our visitors take away from that exhibition? Do we want to inspire them to be more civically engaged?

Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith is incredibly engaging, moving, and a real enticement to act. It's about political history, which is one of our most important collections, but the ultimate emotional impact is that visitors will want to be more engaged in the civic life of our country—both because it's necessary to protect our freedoms but also, in America, it's essential and invigorating to participate in our democracy. You'll see public engagement over time in this exhibition.

Don't forget to look up in that exhibition, too! You'll spot a media installation showing the cacophony of political advertisements that surround Americans, featuring ads from the 1950s to the present day. The installation, which the staff has nicknamed "the cloud," features 81 separate video screens showing American political commercials—powerful, funny, sad, positive, negative—and representing the ways in which we learn who we want to vote for and who we don't want to vote for. It's both fascinating and fun to see the complicated ways in which we make our case to the people.

In recent years, national politics have become a (seemingly) non-stop source of news in the United States. How will the museum's new exhibitions cut through the noise? What will they add to our national conversation?

Politics is often perceived as noise. That's one of the things it's about. But when you get beyond the proverbial "noise" you can explore the ways we express our ideas and beliefs over time. So it's very important to see this constant activity—that's part of what democracy is about. Our exhibition shows how those ideas continue—freedom, who can vote, how people participate—and we believe that every American wants to participate and has the obligation to participate in a democracy that preserves their life, freedom, and opportunities.

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Many Voices, One Nation explores the emblem on our country's Great Seal: E Pluribus Unum, Out of Many, One. Do you have a favorite object or story in that exhibition?

The "Fugees" soccer team story is one of my favorite vignettes in that exhibition! It's about how people came to America with their own traditions and, when they got here, they broadened those traditions, adopting and adapting them. That case is about soccer, sports, school—all these places where people intersect on the playing field and in communities. That's one of my favorite contemporary stories.

As far as a story from further back in time that I love, don't miss the Peter Glass marquetry table. First of all, it's visually striking. Second, it tells a story of isolation, integration, American symbolism, all wrapped up in the story of German immigrants to America.

In Many Voices, One Nation, we investigate the interactions and intersections of different people and the ways in which we have negotiated and worked through differences and challenges to achieve something more than the sum of its parts. Why is it important to study these negotiations and more challenging moments in our shared history?

One of the most exciting ideas in Many Voices, One Nation is that Americans have negotiated with each other for better lives, for a place in the country, for their lifestyles, in ways that have benefited them and, importantly, have benefited America. People from all around the world have come to America, including people who were already here and people who were brought here, and come together over time—sometimes in conflict, sometimes in concord—to create the America we know and we love. Understanding that process is both reassuring and instructive for our future.

The museum's second floor will focus on some of the most discussed issues in America today—politics, religion, migration, and immigration, for example. What is the role of history museums within these big debates?

One thing that's really wonderful about understanding American history is that the hot issues of today were the hot issues of yesterday and the day before. That is a very important notion regarding the dynamic nature of American history. Your National Museum should always be involved in topics that are relevant to people today as well as to those who came before us. Our goal and our deep hope is that we will provide more context to understand the issues to bring us together.

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What's happening on opening day, Wednesday, June 28, 2017?

It's going to be a fun day! Opening day for "The Nation We Build Together" will feature live music, wandering Statue of Liberty characters, a fun LEGO make-and-take activity, and a performance at our Greensboro lunch counter in Unity Square. I'm excited to hear jazz, a conjunto ensemble, and blues in our museum that day as we celebrate the opening. Let's cut some ribbons!

Erin Blasco is the museum's blog and social media manager in the Department of Programs and Audience Development.

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On June 17, 1885, a French ship, the Isère, arrived in New York Harbor laden with very special cargo—more than 200 crates filled with enormous pieces of copper and iron that, once assembled, would form the towering sculpture dubbed "Liberty Enlightening the World"—what the world knows today as the Statue of Liberty. Here at the National Museum of American History, we had our own statue delivery. On March 2, 2017, representatives from the LEGO Group arrived with a 9 ½ foot (or 300 brick) high model of the statue for installation on the museum's first floor. Once installed, it became the first landmark of the theme we celebrate this year—"The Nation We Build Together."

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She might be front and center, but this LEGO model isn't the only Lady Liberty in the building. In fact, a journey through "The Nation We Build Together" offers multiple versions of this iconic sculpture, each with its own unique story and meaning.

On June 28, the museum will debut our newly transformed 2W wing featuring exhibition spaces and hands-on experiences in which we invite our visitors to explore the ideas and ideals of the American people. Among these are two major exhibitions that provide a fresh and challenging look at ways in which those same people made the nation. American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith explores how the nation's revolutionary decision to abandon a monarchy and base its government on the sovereignty of the people left each generation that followed to answer fundamental questions: Who should participate and what role should they have? What common principles and ideas are necessary to make government by the people possible? Many Voices, One Nation maps the cultural geography of America to discover how the many voices of its people have shaped the nation and its communities, fulfilling the Latin aphorism on the Great Seal of the United States—E Pluribus Unum ("Out of many, one").

Amidst hundreds of objects newly on display, both of these signature exhibitions feature multiple depictions of the Statue of Liberty. Certainly, the meanings of Lady Liberty are as diverse as the nation she represents. She has been a monument to the abolition of slavery, a token of the lasting friendship between the people of France and the United States, a figure of welcome for those looking for a new life in America, a beacon of democracy, even a site of protest and dissent. Regardless of how she has been understood over our history, the Statue of Liberty has been, and continues to be, an essential piece of the nation we build together. Beginning June 28, we invite you to explore all that our new wing has to offer, and while there, take some time to look out for Lady Liberty and think about the meanings she might hold for you.

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This small model of the Statue of Liberty, made of terra-cotta and tin, was created around 1884 and based on maquettes created by the statue's sculptor, Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi. It was donated to the Smithsonian in 1885, around the same time that the original statue was making its way to America aboard the Isère. Models like this one were sometimes distributed to individuals who donated funds for construction. That same year, there was a renewed push in fundraising under the direction of Joseph Pulitzer, the publisher of New York World. Through impassioned calls for action in the newspaper, the World received over $100,000 to complete the statue's pedestal, with most donations under one dollar.

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The Statue of Liberty appears as one among numerous symbols and scenes that represent and celebrate the history of the United States adorning this amazing timepiece. The Historical Clock of America is an example of the short-lived phenomenon of building monumental clocks in the late 19th century, when U.S. clockmakers pushed to craft grand creations to rival the cathedral clocks of Europe. It was designed and built around 1893 by a Boston craftsman and stands over 12 feet high and 7 feet wide. Like other such clocks of its day, the Historical Clock of America toured the world, and was displayed as far away as Australia and New Zealand. One of the highlights is a clockwork procession of U.S. presidents, from George Washington to Benjamin Harrison. The Statue of Liberty flanks the clock across from a representation of the Soldiers' National Monument at Gettysburg.

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Created by artist and community organizer Kat Rodriguez, this interpretation of the Statue of Liberty was a focal point for a protest march organized by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) in 2000. As part of the "March for Dignity, Dialogue, and a Fair Wage," she was carried by marchers over 230 miles between Fort Myers and Orlando, Florida, as a call for improved conditions and higher wages for agricultural workers. Rodriguez's depiction of Lady Liberty, complete with tomatoes in place of her typical torch and tablet, serves to connect the struggles of diverse migrant farmworkers with the promise of America as represented by the original Statue of Liberty.

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Originally published in 1943 by the Immigration and Naturalization Service of the U.S. Department of Justice, this guide features the Statue of Liberty prominently on the cover. The manual was intended for judges, civil servants, and others "to dignify and emphasize the importance of citizenship." This included details on the form and meaning of citizenship ceremonies, as well as the history and celebration of "I Am an American Day." In its section of "Source Material," the guide also featured patriotic hymns, songs, and speeches, as well as excerpts from foundational documents that immigrants to the United States were expected to study to earn their citizenship, such as the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

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Manfred Anson (1922–2012) designed this unique Hanukkah lamp (or menorah) to celebrate the centennial of the Statue of Liberty in 1986. Born in Germany, Anson was able to escape to Australia as a refugee from the Nazi regime prior to the war. In 1963, he immigrated to America to join his sister, Sigrid, who had survived the Holocaust. Anson became an avid collector of memorabilia that celebrated his new home. In creating the design for his menorah, Anson used 19th-century souvenir Liberty figurines as the basis for the candle holders, and topped the lamp with another common American symbol, the eagle. Each small statue is also engraved with the name of a person or event central to Jewish history.

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Before the Statue of Liberty became the foremost female figure to symbolize the nation, there was Columbia. Commonly depicted as the personification of the United States, this goddess of liberty usually wore a Phrygian cap, the classical symbol of freedom (and a feature shared by Marianne, the symbolic representation of the French Republic). This hand-carved wooden version of Columbia was erected atop the pilothouse of the side-wheel steamboat Mary Powell in 1864. Known as the "Queen of the Hudson," the Mary Powell transported passengers daily during the summer months between Kingston, New York, and Lower Manhattan. The figure of Columbia, our first "Lady Liberty," was saved when the Mary Powell was retired and broken up for scrap in 1923.

Tim Winkle is the deputy chair and curator in the Division of Home and Community Life.

Museum Specialist Noriko Sanefuji and Curator Katherine Ott invited students in Dr. Samuel J. Redman's Museum and Historic Site Interpretation seminar to explore the museum's collections related to Japanese American incarceration during World War II and write blog posts sharing their research. These posts by passionate students of history and aspiring museum workers offer different perspectives on this part of American history.

In 1983 the United States Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC) asked, "What if vandals broke into your home, sprayed graffiti, and ransacked your property simply because of race, gender, or religious affiliation?" For some Japanese Americans during the 1940s, this was not a hypothetical question. The CWRIC's "what if" question really happened, as the nine-member commission explored in its investigation of the effects of Japanese American incarceration during World War II.

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This year marks the 75th anniversary of Executive Order 9066, a document that President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed in 1942, two months after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor. The order resulted in the incarceration of 75,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry and 45,000 Japanese nationals in prison camps across the country, many being relocated far from home.

The findings of the CWRIC, titled "Personal Justice Denied," confirmed that as the federal government evicted and incarcerated Japanese American citizens living in the western United States, their homes were neglected. Left untended, formerly lively domestic spaces were ransacked, defaced, and even looted while homeowners made do in the crowded barracks of incarceration camps.

In her 1993 book Jewel of the Desert, historian Sandra C. Taylor explains that these evicted citizens rushed to sell businesses and the possessions they could not carry in a single suitcase. While they were away from home, people in their communities—often former neighbors— looted Japanese households along the West Coast.

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Concerns for their homes and possessions left behind must have weighed on the minds of incarcerated Japanese Americans—before departure, some of them had already seen the disrespect that could befall many of their homes. During the eviction process, for example, police action sometimes imperiled homes and possessions. Several people speaking in oral histories in John Tateishi's 1999 work And Justice for All detail the experience of these evictions and the fate of many their households. Before his incarceration to the Minidoka camp, Chiye Tomihiro explained that authorities arrested her father and "ransacked the apartment, taken a lot of things, and left the door open, unlocked." In this case, police action literally opened the door for looters.

After an average of three years of incarceration, many Japanese Americans returned to their homes upon their release. While incarcerated, their homes remained unprotected from those who wished to do harm. According to the CWRIC, several returning inmates "found their homes or farms ill-cared-for, overgrown with weeds, badly tended or destroyed [while] one person reported finding strangers living in his former home." When Tomoye Takahashi and her family returned home, she explained, "I just stood there and wept. It was the greatest happening; I was finally coming home." However, her relief wore off quickly. Taylor explains in Jewel of the Desert that the Takahashis found their locked basement storage room—where the family stored special possessions, including jewelry, family heirlooms, photos, wedding gifts, kimonos, and other sentimental items—burglarized.

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Even some homes and belongings of Japanese American veterans who fought in World War II faced sad circumstances. Injured in June 1944 while serving in Italy as a member of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, Wilson Makabe returned to the West Coast and "learned that someone had set fire to our house in Loomis, [California]," according to And Justice for All. Joe Takeda arrived back to his Santa Clara County home in California and faced assailants dousing his home in gasoline and firing shots at his vehicle, according to Jewel of the Desert. Police reported finding empty gasoline containers, liquor bottles, and severed telephone lines at Takeda's home.

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Pictured above, Iku Tsuchiya's small suitcase held her most treasured household possessions, as the federal government evicted her from her home. Inmates could carry only pieces of a household with them to the camps, leaving the majority of their belongings behind. According to author Michi Nishiura Weglyn in Years of Infamy: The Untold Story of America's Concentration Camps, a postwar survey estimated that 80% of goods and property stored with private, non-government entities were ransacked, stolen, or sold. However, some homes survived the turmoil. Former Topaz inmate Donald Nakahata returned to his home at 2092 Pine Street in San Francisco, California, bluntly stating that "The house is still there," as recounted in And Justice for All. Though many Japanese American families faced devastation upon returning home, they rebuilt ravaged households, families, and fractured livelihoods.

In studying historic houses, I personally grapple with understanding the effects of time and place on domestic spaces. In this context, however, it becomes clearer that people's lives remain imbued in these extant spaces, no matter how much time and place leave their mark on one's home.

Learn more about the experiences of Japanese Americans during World War II in the museum's exhibition Righting a Wrong: Japanese Americans and World War II.

The exhibition was generously supported by the Terasaki Family Foundation, with additional assistance from the Japanese American Citizens League and AARP.

Nolan Cool is a graduate student in the Public History Program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Students in Dr. Samuel J. Redman's Museums and Historic Sites graduate seminar were invited to write guest blog posts like this one.

Museum Specialist Noriko Sanefuji and Curator Katherine Ott invited students in Dr. Samuel J. Redman's Museum and Historic Site Interpretation seminar to explore the museum's collections related to Japanese American incarceration during World War II and write blog posts sharing their research. These posts by passionate students of history and aspiring museum workers offer different perspectives on this part of American history.

Alice Tetsuko Kono was cleaning her parents' house in Molokai, Hawaii, when she heard the news about Pearl Harbor. Her radio began to chirp an urgent broadcast about the Japanese attack. She ran to tell her parents, and the family kept the radio on all day as more reports flowed in. That December day arguably changed the course of Kono's life, as it likely had the lives of many other young people of her generation. Just two years later, she enlisted in the Women's Army Corps and began a journey that would take her to California, Texas, Georgia, Minnesota, and Washington, D.C. The experience would test her mentally and physically and ultimately teach her one of her greatest lessons—"be useful." She shared her experiences in an oral history with the Veterans History Project in 2004.

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When the United States declared war on Japan on December 8, 1941, women were not allowed to serve in the military. As the need for personnel grew, however, the government's policy changed. On May 14, 1942, Congress passed a bill establishing the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC). On July 1, 1943, this auxiliary organization was officially incorporated into the U.S. Army and became the Women's Army Corps (WAC). (For more on the history of WAAC and WAC, the army's website has background.)

Over 150,000 American women would eventually serve with the WAC during the war. However, as "enemy aliens," women of Japanese ancestry were not eligible to join the U.S. military. This prohibition remained in place until early 1943, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved the formation of the all-Japanese American 442nd Regimental Combat Team. The WAC opened enlistment to Japanese American women in November 1943.

In 1943, while on vacation in Honolulu, Kono encountered WAC recruiters. "I told my parents that I'm going to join," she recalled, admitting that her parents had mixed reactions to the announcement. According to Kono, "my dad said 'go ahead!' but my mother didn't say anything." Kono went ahead with her registration and physical exams while in Honolulu. On returning to Molokai, she informed her parents that she had passed. In a 2004 interview, Kono laughed as she recalled her parents' responses: "My mom was fit to be tied and she didn't speak to my dad for a while! . . . Because he said I was so short that he didn't think they [the army] would take me! But they fooled my dad."

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During and after the war, many people questioned why Japanese Americans wanted to serve a country that considered them "enemy aliens" and had begun the process of incarcerating people of Japanese ancestry just 48 hours after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Over the course of the war, the federal government removed almost 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry in from the western United States into incarceration camps. As a Hawaiian resident in Hawaii, however, Kono and her family fared better than many Japanese Americans on the mainland. In 1941, over 150,000 Japanese Americans lived in Hawaii, according to "Japanese in Hawaii: a Historical and Demographic Perspective," published in the Hawaiian Journal of History in 1977. Not only did Japanese Americans constitute one third of Hawaii's total population, they also held jobs that were vital to Hawaii's economy and infrastructure. Because of these realities, the government chose not to remove Japanese Americans living in Hawaii to incarceration camps, which accounts for Kono's freedom.

Ultimately, Japanese American men and women had many reasons for serving. For Kono and many others, it was a sense of loyalty and patriotism. Kono wanted to volunteer "because my brother wasn't in the service and there was nobody in our family that was in the service, so I thought somebody should be loyal to the country." Grace Harada, who also served with the WACs, felt she "wasn't accomplishing anything" at home and wanted to help her brother, who had already joined the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Other men and women cited a desire to end the war as soon as possible, the opportunity to travel, and the potential for obtaining an education and developing job skills.

Kono reported for duty in November 1943 along with 58 other women from Hawaii. "There were Japanese [women], Filipinos, mixed-races, Koreans, Chinese," she recalled. They spent roughly three weeks at Fort Ruger in Honolulu before boarding the USS Madison for California. From there, they traveled by train to Fort Oglethorpe in Georgia for basic training. Kono recalls, "we had marching, physical exercises, doing all the push-ups and sit-ups, and we even had gas masks!"

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From Georgia, Kono went to Des Moines, Iowa, for clerical training and lessons in relevant military terminology. From Iowa, Kono was shipped to the Military Intelligence Service (MIS) Language School at Fort Snelling, Minnesota.

As the possibility of war had grown in 1941, U.S. military officials had realized that they did not have enough personnel fluent in Japanese. They decided that Japanese Americans like Kono were the best candidates for linguistic intelligence training and began recruiting them for instruction in language schools. The basic curriculum included reading, writing, and conversation as well as lessons in Japanese army terms, military codes, and tactics. "That was intensive training," Kono remembered. "That wasn't easy. Up early and study all day, and in the evening you studied again. . . . There was more military language that we were very unfamiliar with."

Though Japan had officially surrendered before Kono graduated from language school in November 1945, she had not yet completed her 18-month enlistment period, so the army sent her to Fort Ritchie in Cascade, Maryland. For the next four months, she translated captured documents sent from the Pacific. Kono was assigned to the "air section" of the MIS, or the group responsible for translating captured documents pertaining to "planes and stuff like that." She continued that assignment after being shipped to Fort Myer, Virginia, until she returned to Honolulu and was honorably discharged.

After leaving the Army, Kono returned to Molokai and resumed her prewar job at Del Monte Foods, though she soon used her GI Bill funds to obtain secretarial training and became a company secretary. Five years later she "got kinda restless" and transferred to the San Francisco office, where she worked for the next 30 years.

In the 18 months that Alice Tetsuko Kono served in the Women's Army Corps, she traveled across the United States and received intensive training in Japanese, demonstrating admirable loyalty to a country wary of its Japanese American citizens. Without a doubt, Kono truly succeeded in her goal to "be useful."

To hear Alice Tetsuko Kono's full interview, visit the Veterans History Project.

Katherine Fecteau recently earned her M.A. in the Public History program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Students in Dr. Samuel J. Redman's Museum and Historic Site Interpretation graduate seminar were invited to write guest blog posts like this one.

As collections managers and museum specialists, our job is to care, physically and intellectually, for the museum's objects. We research them, ensure their safety and proper handling, and install them in the museum's exhibitions. We are frequently asked "What exactly does putting up an exhibition entail?" so we present:

The top 10 things you need to know about exhibition installation

10) Installation is the culmination of years of work

Exhibitions take several years to put together. It all begins with an idea. Objects are selected, researched, and conserved. Scripts are written, edited, and re-written. A design team uses those ideas to create a drawing of the proposed exhibition. When a final design is reached, then the exhibition can be built. Walls are put up and cases are constructed. Only then can curators and collections managers begin actual object installation. Before anything was built for the exhibition American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith, which opened on June 28, 2017, the team had been working for almost five years.

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9) Object installation is the shortest part of creating an exhibition, but also the most intense

Larger exhibitions such as American Democracy (AD) take several months to install. AD has almost 900 objects, and each one of those objects needs to be individually mounted (see number seven for more on that), installed, and then lit. This process can take anywhere from minutes to hours for each object depending on how complicated the requirements of the object and design are.

8) It requires mental and physical flexibility

Installation can be demanding. You are standing, walking, lifting, bending, reaching, and climbing ladders. We easily can take over 10,000 steps on any given day of exhibition installation (we know because we've tracked it!). Working in small cases and maneuvering around case furniture can require some interesting gymnastics. For instance, when we installed the woman suffrage wagon (the very first object that went in the exhibition) we had to lie on the floor underneath it while it was placed to ensure it was in proper position and safely on its jacks (we truly see the exhibition from all angles!).

In addition to the physical demands, it can also be mentally taxing. A collections manager has to know the objects well to be able to care for them properly, which means knowing what each object is, what it is made of, how to handle it appropriately, and if it needs any particular special care. You have to know the exhibition design to follow which objects go in which cases. And if a certain case is not ready to be installed, you have to be able to continue to move forward; with an opening date already set, you can't sit and wait. There is a lot of thinking on your tired feet.

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7) If done well, you will probably never notice one of the most important features of an exhibition: MOUNTS

While some objects can be displayed simply sitting on the case bottom, many require specialized mounts to position them safely in the case and allow for optimum viewing. Highly skilled mountmakers fabricate custom mounts for each specific object, and they are often so carefully crafted as to blend seamlessly with the object. The type of mount fabricated is based on the design layout for how the object is to be displayed along with the conservation and support needs of each particular object. Mountmakers work with curators, conservators, and collections managers to determine the best mount for each object and then meticulously craft each piece, measuring and testing it multiple times to ensure a perfect fit. It requires a great amount of attention to detail, but the result is that a good mount is a piece of artwork in itself.

Some of the mounts done for American Democracy:

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6) Lighting can make or break an exhibition—and its objects

Exhibition spaces are generally dark because light is damaging. Light causes things to fade and become brittle. However, it isn't worth putting objects on view if there isn't enough light to see them! Curators, collections managers, and conservators determine how much light an object can tolerate before incurring damage (measured in foot candles, a measurement of light intensity equal to the amount of light given off by one candle at a distance of one foot). Armed with that information, a team of lighting designers very carefully light each object in order to balance care for the object with public visibility. Lighting can set the tone for the exhibition as well, from creating a lively environment to a more subdued tone depending on the subject matter, similar to theater stage lighting (in fact many of the lighting designers we've worked with have backgrounds in stage lighting). When the house lights go off and exhibition-specific lighting is all that remains, not only are the objects better cared for, but the setting takes on a hushed, almost reverential feeling that emphasizes the importance of the objects themselves.

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5) Math: turns out even history majors need it, particularly during an exhibition installation

We often joke to friends and family that we don't do math because we are history people. But much to our dismay, we do have to do math. We have to give accurate measurements to the exhibition designers who must design the cases to the correct dimensions. We also have to be able to calculate square footage. We have to figure out how to center something of X size within a given space (Bethanee in particular does not have a natural affinity for this, she claims). Thankfully on this installation we had mountmakers who were skilled at this to take care of most of the cases. However, in the long campaign cases we refer to as our "gimmicks cases" we had to figure out how to fit over 400 objects into 24.25 linear feet. It took several team members many hours of creating layouts to get that just right!

You can put math on the "list of things we never thought we'd be doing when we majored in history." Considering that most people probably imagine history majors spending their careers in quiet libraries or dim archives, you could probably add a lot of things to that list, which brings us to number four:

4) When installing, you find yourself in some interesting places

Places we never expected to find ourselves on the job but did: At the top of a 12 foot ladder. Underneath a case. Inside a case. Crawling through a hole in the wall. Covered in dust from cleaning. Pulling mannequins on a flatbed. Lifting an 80-pound glass case cover. Driving a pallet jack. Using glass cups (think suction cups with handles that we use to open cases).

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3) Every installation is different

Between the two of us, we've worked on at least 10 exhibition installations out of the Division of Political History, and no two have been quite alike. The basis of each installation is the same, but each has its own unique set of circumstances. They are different not only because of who you work with, but because the objects are different. For example, a costume-heavy exhibition has different needs than American Democracy, which is mostly paper and 3D objects. The different objects require different mounts, different lighting, and different conservation techniques.

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2) It's equal parts difficult and a blast

Putting up an exhibition in time for a target opening date can require a lot of long, intense days, but it is also really, really fun. We work very closely with the entire exhibition crew (which includes case fabricators, conservators, construction teams, mountmakers, security, lighting designers, and many, many more) and develop a friendly working relationship. We are all required to work in close proximity, and frequently joke that the somewhat chaotic installation process is like a three-ring circus: mountmakers are installing objects, cases are being lit, and case alarms are being tested. After years of planning, the physical work is a whirlwind. You don't have time to get bored. As crews pack up to go home when opening nears, you get the bittersweet feeling of the end of a school year, a large dose of relief with a side of "I'm going to miss these people and this task."

And let's face it, being around objects like Thomas Jefferson's desk and the Great Clock of America never, ever gets old.

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1) It's never actually over

Even after we've opened the exhibitions to the public, we are never truly done. We periodically rotate light-sensitive objects such as textiles and paper so they don't get damaged from too much light exposure. We update sections of exhibitions to keep them current (in American Democracy, especially, we will need to update our campaign section to reflect new political cycles). The curators and museum specialists responsible for the exhibition have to oversee it for its entire lifespan, be it six months or 20 years, and caring for it physically and intellectually doesn't end until it's de-installed.

But de-installation is another story.

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Sara Murphy and Bethanee Bemis are museum specialists and collections managers in the Division of Political History.

I had the pleasure of participating in the grand opening of the museum’s impressive new wing, The Nation We Build Together. The design of the displays brings the exhibition themes to life, allowing visitors to learn, see, hear, and experience how Americans have come together over time to create our country. I wanted to share a few of my early impressions, both for those planning to visit in person and also for those who will experience these stories through our websites, blogs, and social media.

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The four exhibitions in this new wing—American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith; Many Voices, One Nation; Religion in Early America; and Within These Walls—trace a 500-year journey into our past and show how our ideals and ideas have evolved through the 21^st century. The galleries invite us to view precious national treasures and explore our early history, allowing us to reflect on our own ideas and perceptions.

The displays encourage us to think about what it means to be American, to participate in the democratic process, and to vote. Most of us over 18 have experience in casting our ballots. But the principles of self-government to which we are accustomed in America are not universal rights: they were conceived by our forebears and realized through a bold experiment that has been sorely tested at times, but endures. Seventy-five years after the Constitution was ratified, Abraham Lincoln, speaking on the war-ravaged battlefield of Gettysburg, promised a country torn by conflict and heartbreak that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

And today, more than two centuries later, this “experiment” lives on.

In the exhibitions and educational spaces of The Nation We Build Together, we come face to face both with famous figures and also those who were less celebrated. All have shaped our history in ways both subtle and profound. Many voices contribute to American life, whether they enjoyed opportunities, overcame challenges, encountered social and cultural change, or suffered the heartbreak of war or economic hardship.

We recognize ourselves, our ancestors, and our families’ stories in these exhibitions. The artifacts on display—sports memorabilia, eating utensils, works of art—can evoke nostalgia or curiosity on a personal level, and they show that our culture is and has always been one that evolves when it comes in contact with new cultures.

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These stories of community and struggle remind us that American democracy is strong and resilient, flexible enough to survive challenge and open enough for us to share in a common purpose. Here are two of my favorite examples I got to see on a recent tour:

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We are reminded every day by the news and through social media that changes to American society are often feared, that we can be divided by strongly held opinions and opposing perspectives. From my perspective, though, although change can sometimes cause discord and uncertainty, fierce debate and robust citizen engagement have always driven the progress and dynamism that defines America. These exhibitions celebrate the role that all of the nation’s residents play in our democracy.

The American story has many chapters. Through these new exhibitions and others in all of our museums, through all of our research and educational activities, the Smithsonian tries to tell the full story. Our exhibitions, research, collections, and programs have evolved to keep pace with our ever-changing country. These exhibitions exemplify the solid research, commitment to objectivity, and dedication to open and civil discourse that guide the Smithsonian and that have proven to be crucial to our democratic system.

Dr. David J. Skorton is the 13th Secretary of the Smithsonian.