How much is the Hope Diamond worth? Ask Smithsonian.

Our inquisitive readers are rising to the challenge we gave them last month. The questions are pouring in and we’re ready for more. Do you have any questions for our curators? Submit your questions here.

How much is the Hope Diamond worth? — Marjorie Mathews, Silver Spring, Maryland

That’s the most popular question we get, but we don’t really satisfy people by giving them a number. There are a number of answers, but the best one is that we honestly don’t know. It’s a little bit like Liz Taylor’s jewels being sold in December—all kinds of people guessed at what they would sell for, but everybody I know was way off. Only when those pieces were opened up to bidding at a public auction could you find out what their values were. When they were sold, then at least for that day and that night you could say, well, they were worth that much. The Hope Diamond is kind of the same way, but more so. There’s simply nothing else like it. So how do you put a value on the history, on the fact it’s been here on display for over 50 years and a few hundred million people have seen it, and on that fact it’s a rare blue diamond on top of everything else? You don’t. – Jeffrey E. Post, mineralogist, National Museum of Natural History

What’s the worst impact of ocean acidification so far?- Nancy Schaefer, Virginia Beach, Virginia

The impacts of ocean acidification are really just starting to be felt, but two big reports that came out in 2011 show that it could have very serious effects on coral reefs. These studies did not measure the warming effect of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but rather its effect of making the ocean more acidic when it dissolves in the ocean. Places where large amounts of carbon dioxide seep into the water from the sea floor provide a natural experiment and show us how ocean waters might look, say, 50 or 100 years from now. Both studies showed branching, lacy, delicate coral forms are likely to disappear, and with them that kind of three-dimensional complexity so many species depend on. Also, other species that build a stony skeleton or shell, such as oysters or mussels, are likely to be affected. This happens because acidification makes carbonate ions, which these species need for their skeletons, less abundant.

Nancy Knowlton, marine biologist
National Museum of Natural History

Art and artifacts from ancient South Pacific and Pacific Northwest tribes have similarities in form and function. Is it possible that early Hawaiians caught part of the Kuroshio Current of the North Pacific Gyre to end up along the northwest coast of America from northern California to Alaska? — April Croan, Maple Valley, Washington

Those similarities have given rise to various theories, including trans-Pacific navigation, independent drifts of floating artifacts, inadvertent crossings by ships that have lost their rudders or rigging, or whales harpooned in one area that died or were captured in a distant place. Some connections are well-known, like feather garment fragments found in an archaeological site in Southeast Alaska that appear to have been brought there by whaling ships that had stopped in the Hawaiian Islands, a regular route for 19th-century whalers. Before the period of European contact, the greatest similarities are with the southwest Pacific, not Hawaii. The Kushiro current would have facilitated Asian coastal contacts with northwestern North America, but would not have helped Hawaiians. The problem of identification is one of context, form and dating. Most of the reported similarities are either out of their original context (which can’t be reconstructed), or their form is not specific enough to relate to another area’s style, or the date of creation cannot be established. To date there is no acceptable proof for South Pacific-Northwest Coast historical connections that predates the European whaling era, except for links that follow the coastal region of the North Pacific into Alaska.

William Fitzhugh, archeologist
Natural History Museum

The Black List features portraits of fifty African Americans who are influential in their fields, such as Chris Rock, above. Image courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery.

February is Black History Month, and if you’re wondering how to properly commemorate the holiday, look no further. There are lots of (mostly free) events around the Mall this month celebrating African American heritage.

Black History Month Family Day: On Saturday, February 4, kick off the month with a full afternoon of music, performances and crafts at the National Portrait Gallery and American Art Museum. Enjoy the blues stylings of “Guitar Man” Warner Williams and a puppet show, Can You Spell Harlem? Plus, learn the art of step in a workshop by the Taratibu Youth Association step performers. After the festivities end, head over to the McEvoy Auditorium for a screening of Chris Rock’s documentary, Good Hair. Free. 11:30 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Film screening at 3:30 p.m.

Tales from Mother Africa: Kenyan poet, singer, storyteller and dancer Anna Mwalagho weaves traditional tales from “Mama Africa” into an interactive performance at S. Dillon Ripley Center’s Discovery Theater on February 2 and 3. The program is geared toward young children, but a little singing and dancing is good for adults, too. Tickets required: $8 for adults, $6 for children, $5 for Resident Associate Members, $3 for children under 2. 10:15 a.m. and 11:30 a.m.

Enslavement to Emancipation: Celebrate the 150th anniversary of the passage of the District of Columbia’s Emancipation Act in 1862 with a video and discussion at the Anacostia Community Museum. The talk will touch on a wide range of subjects, including the Civil War, laws governing slavery, the abolitionist movement, and civil rights. Free. Reserve a spot at 202-633-4844. February 5 at 2:00 p.m. and and February 24 at 10:30 a.m.

Monticello, Slavery, and the Hemingses: Join NPR host Michel Martin and Harvard Law professor Annette Gordon-Reed for a discussion about the six Monticello slave families featured in the exhibition “Paradox of Liberty: Slavery at Jefferson’s Monticello” at the American History Museum. Hosted by the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Martin and Gordon-Reed will challenge conventional wisdom about slavery and the political reality of the era. Professor Gordon-Reed’s book, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family will also be discussed. Free. February 6 from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. Baird Auditorium, Natural History Museum.

Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975: The Black Power movement has been both venerated and vilified, but what exactly did it mean? Test your knowledge at the National Portrait Gallery’s screening of The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975, which documents this tumultuous period and features interviews with activists Angela Davis, Bobby Seale and Stokely Carmichael. Free. February 18 at 1:00 p.m.

The Black List: Reinterpreting the exclusionary definition of a “blacklist,” photographer/filmmaker Timothy Greenfield-Sanders and NPR’s Elvis Mitchell compiled a list of people who represent the African American experience in the 20th century. The result is an inspiring exhibition of large-format photographic portraits and film interviews of artists, politicians, writers, athletes and civil rights activists who have made a difference in their fields. The 50 portraits on display include musician John Legend, artist Kara Walker and political activist Angela Davis. On view at the National Portrait Gallery until April 22.

Groundbreaking for the National Museum of African American History and Culture: Almost a decade after the establishment of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, construction on the museum site breaks ground on February 22. Catch the webcast of the groundbreaking ceremony, which will feature speeches and musical performances starting at 9:00 a.m. The museum construction should be finished in 2015, so you’ll have plenty of time to head down to the new site between the Washington Monument and the American History Museum and check its progress.

For the full schedule of Black History Month events, click here.

The Art of Video Games exhibit opens at the American Art Museum on March 16.

We know you’ve got enough “looking forward to 2012″ lists under your belt by now; our Who to Follow post alone will keep you pretty busy. But we can’t resist sneaking in just one more. Here’s our guide to the exhibitions we’re most excited for this year. Mark your calendars now so you’ll have no excuse to say you’re bored later.

A new look at Monticello: Founding father Thomas Jefferson called slavery an “abominable crime”. . . but owned more than 600 slaves who sustained his plantation, Monticello. “Slavery at Jefferson’s Monticello: Paradox of Liberty,” opened on January 27 in the American History Museum‘s National Museum of African American History and Culture Gallery, and focuses on the long-overlooked history of slave life at the third president’s Virginia home. Be sure to keep up with the latest news from Monticello on Twitter at @TJMonticello.

Happy birthday, Jackson Pollock: If he were alive today, Jackson Pollock would have turned 100 on January 28. To honor the stormy life and revolutionary work of the modern art icon, the Archives of American Art presents Pollock’s personal family photos, letters, and writings in “Art Memories Arrested in Space, a centennial tribute to Jackson Pollock” at the Reynolds Center through May 15.

Game on: Can video games be art? To answer that question, the American Art Museum‘s upcoming exhibit, “The Art of Video Games,” pulls together the most arresting graphics and innovative designs in the gaming world, on view March 16 through September 30. Even if you forgot to vote for your favorite game, don’t miss out on GameFest, which kicks off the exhibit with three days packed with open play, panel talks with artists and designers, and live-action gaming. To tide you over til March, follow curator Chris Melissinos at @CMelissinos for updates and teasers.

Hokusai: In anticipation of the Cherry Blossom Centennial, the Sackler Gallery presents a study of Katsushika Hosukai, Japan’s most famous artist (yes, that’s his Great Wave that has probably graced every college dorm wall in America). “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji,” his most acclaimed woodblock print series, was first published in 1830 when Hokusai was in his 70s and goes on view on March 24 through June 17. The gallery has set up an interactive website with more information on Hokusai’s life and artistic technique.

Ai Weiwei: The controversial Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, arrested last year, brings a new installation, “Fragments,” to the Sackler Gallery beginning May 12. Using antique wood salvaged from Qing Dynasty temples, Ai worked with skilled traditional carpenters to create what he calls an “irrational structure” that both affirms and defies centuries of architectural traditions. In October, the Hirshhorn gets in on the action with an exhibit of 25 of Ai’s recent works entitled “Ai Weiwei: According to What?” For an English translation of Ai’s Twitter, follow @aiwwenglish.

Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's plantation, was run by hundreds of enslaved African Americans in his lifetime. Image courtesy of Monticello.

In June of 1776, Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal.” But after he signed his name to that now immortal document, he returned home to Monticello and resumed a lifestyle that denied this equality to more than 600 men, women and children who toiled as slaves on his Virginian plantation. Over the course of the third president’s lifetime, Jefferson would set only two of them free.

A new exhibition, “Slavery at Jefferson’s Monticello: Paradox of Liberty,” now on view at the National Museum of American History, addresses this fundamental contradiction in the life of one of America’s greatest leaders. “Jefferson wrote and saved 19,000 letters in his life, so we know a vast amount about him,” says Elizabeth Chew, a curator at Monticello and co-curator of the exhibition, along with Rex Ellis of the National Museum of African American History and Culture. “But all we had of these enslaved people,” Chew adds, “was his list of their names.”

From this list, Chew and Ellis, wove together a picture of another Monticello, home to the weavers, spinners, blacksmiths, tinsmiths, nail-makers, carpenters, sawyers, charcoal-burners, stablemen, joiners, and domestic servants that kept the plantation operating. The exhibit features Jefferson’s records and artifacts from Mulberry Row—the slave quarters. But most importantly, it follows six families through the generations: arrival at Monticello as slaves; dispersal at Jefferson’s death in 1827; migration across the country down to their descendants today.

These families are descended from Elizabeth Hemings and her children, Edward and Jane Gillette, George and Ursula Granger David and Isabel Hern and James and Cate Hubbard. Thanks to the Getting Word oral history project at Monticello, which has collected interviews from more than 170 descendants, the exhibit tells colorful stories about how they lived, what their work was, what skills they had, where they came from, and where they went.

According to Chew, looking at Monticello through the eyes of slaves is a relatively new perspective. Until the mid-1980s, tours at Monticello avoided the topic of slavery, often referring to slaves more euphemistically as “servants.” Sometimes they were cut out of the story entirely; tour guides and signs “would say things like “the food was brought” from the kitchen to the dining room,” Chew says. “Now we would say, the head cook Edith Fossett and her assistants brought the food from the kitchen to the dining room.”

For Chew, the most significant aspect of this exhibit is “the degree to which we can make the story of slavery the story of individual people and families.”

Bringing these people back into the narrative is essential to understanding Thomas Jefferson’s life and work. As Ellis said in a press preview, “They represent the community who brought him to his father on a pillow when he was born to those who adjusted the pillow under his head when he died.”

By extension, understanding Jefferson’s own complexities illuminates the contradictions within the country he built. “Most Americans probably don’t think of it, but the founders founded this country as a slave society, and that didn’t go away for a hundred years,” Chew says. The paradox of Jefferson, who called slavery “an abominable crime” and proposed several plans to end the slave trade, is a perfect lens for the national tensions that resulted in the bloodiest war in American history.

At their core, however, these stories are first and foremost about individuals and families. Because many African Americans cannot trace their family back past the Civil War, the stories collected here are especially precious. Bill Webb, a descendent of the Hemings family, explains his decision to try to find out his lineage: “I love history. I think it’s about a sense of who you are, and knowing some of your history.” Webb’s ancestor, Brown Colbert, was sold by Thomas Jefferson to another slaveowner in Lexington, Virginia, before he was freed by the American Colonization Society on the condition that he leave the United States for Liberia in Africa. Though Colbert and the children who accompanied him died shortly after arriving in Liberia, one of his daughters stayed in America and became the matriarch of Webb’s family. “They kept his name through generations–Brown, Brown, Brown,” Webb says.

Of course, the story doesn’t end there. Webb, for one, plans to return to the exhibit many times with his family: “I’ve warned my friends who live in DC that they’ll see a lot of us, because it takes time to absorb everything. There’s just so much to see.”

“Slavery at Jefferson’s Monticello: Paradox of Liberty,” presented by Monticello and the National Museum of African American History and Culture, is on view at the American History Museum from January 27 through October 14, 2012.

Residents of Indianola, Mississippi, share stories about their family "Treasures" with curator Elaine Nichols, of the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Photo courtesy of the museum

As part of the museum’s “Save Our African American Treasures” program, representatives from the National Museum of African American History and Culture made a trip to Indianola, Mississippi. For two days earlier this month, people were invited to bring family heirlooms and other items of historical and cultural significance to the B.B. King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center for a one-on-one consultation with a Smithsonian expert.

The mission of the “Treasures” program is twofold: to raise awareness about how important family heirlooms are in telling the story of African American history to future generations, and to provide information about how to care for them. Occasionally, the museum even acquires some of the artifacts for its collection. (In April 2008, we included a story about a sleeping-car porter’s hat that turned up at a Chicago event.)

I spoke with Elaine Nichols, supervisory curator of culture at NMAAHC, who reviewed the items that were brought in to the B.B. King Museum. Nichols joined the museum’s staff in October 2009 and has attended other “Treasures” events in Charleston and Beaufort, South Carolina, and Atlanta, Georgia.

What were some of the most exciting treasures that came in?

Well, of course, they are all exciting, because people are bringing in their family objects. For the most part, there were items that were passed down through individuals’ families. Some were purchased. Some were gifts. There were some interesting ones. There was a child’s organ that we looked at that was made by the Magnus Company. It was an electric organ, and she [the owner] said her mother gave it to her in 1948. She would have been about a year old at the time. It was in great condition. It looked like it was probably made out of Bakelite, but it actually played. It was the first time I had seen a child’s organ. She was quite proud and quite pleased to bring it in. Most of the people are excited about the items that they are bringing in.

A woman brought in a rectangular, wooden box. On the outside, it said it was made by a particular tobacco company. It had their label on it. So people kind of got excited because they recognized the name of the tobacco company. And, she said, “Oh no, that is not what is in the box.” It had about eight to ten locks and braids of hair, hair that would have belonged to different individuals. Some were brunette, some were blonde, some were very fine, some were coarse, and a few pieces were wrapped in newspaper. Probably one of the earliest was from 1848, and one of the latter pieces was from 1861. Then, a few had notes attached to them that gave the date and the name of the person whose hair it was. My thinking is that it was hair that was going to be used to make a hair wreath, which is sort of like a genealogy chart with hair. You can shape the hair into attractive flowers or other kinds of decorative designs. But sometimes it is used for mourning jewelry. We don’t really have an idea of knowing how it would have been used, but since there are so many locks of hair, there is a good possibility that it could have been used in that way.

There was a woman who brought in two silver coins. One was a Mexican coin dated 1828 and then another coin from Peru that was dated 1835.

Pocket watches, there was one that was there that was made by Remington Watch Company. We probably needed to do quite a bit more research, because in some cases you have the watch workings that are made by one company and then the casing made by another company. We think that might have been the case with this particular watch. In those cases, we point people towards their local libraries, where they can get lots of resource information and, of course, the Internet.

Someone brought in a tire repair kit. Now, someone else might look at that and say, wow, I wonder why that is a big deal? But, again, it was something that was important to that individual. We consider all of the items that people bring in important items because they belong to them. We try to encourage them to tell us their stories before we begin talking about the item, trying to date it or to talk about the material or condition. We let them talk to us about the history of the item.

I think they are all precious stories because, again, when you see someone coming in with whatever it is, the dictionary, the photograph, the quilt, the doll, it is important to them. So if it is important to them, it is important to us.

What are you looking for as a reviewer?

Our role is to be there to talk to people about how to take care of the objects that they bring in. If something is rusting, what are there options for stopping the rust and preserving it? Or, if it is a photograph and it is starting to fade, what do you do? In an instance like that we often recommend that people copy those photographs and distribute them to other family members, so that if something happens to the original, you have another resource for accessing it. So it is about conservation and care of the items that they have.

In some cases, we would make a new box or what we call “housing” for the object. For instance, someone had a Bible dictionary that belonged to their father and grandfather who were both ministers. It was in somewhat fragile condition, so we recommended that they allow our person to make a box to house that item, an acid-free box that they could take home.

One lady brought in an alligator purse that probably belonged to her mother because it was found among her mother’s things. It had a few condition problems, and we talked about that. It was an odd shape, because it had the head of the small alligator and the feet, both the front and hind feet, attached to it. But we created a special box for it.

They were all pleased that someone was looking at those items, that we were talking to them about the specific objects and about how to care for them. People said, you know, the fact that the Smithsonian has come to Indianola, Mississippi, really makes us feel special. We just think it is really important that we include rural communities as part of these services that we offer, as well as large urban areas. It is all America’s history and the history of African American culture. And, we are excited to provide this service to them.

Will you be considering any of the artifacts for the museum’s collection?

We were not at that level of conversation. What will happen is we will review all of the information that we collected and then we might follow up with individuals that we feel like we need to have additional conversations with.

The next “Save our American Treasures” event will be in Houston, Texas, at the Houston Public Library on October 29, 2011.

Come see animals like this porcupine at mealtime. Photo courtesy National Zoo

Monday, August 29 Zoo Cuisine

What do zoo animals eat? Find out at the daily feedings beginning at 10:15 with the fish feedings at the Kids’ Farm. You can see up to seven feedings a day, including the giant Pacific octopus at the Invertebrate House at 11:15 and 3; the sloth bears at 11:30 on the Asia Trail, and the small mammals at their house at 1:45. Don’t be late; the feedings last only 15 to 20 minutes. Free. National Zoo

Tuesday, August 30 “For All the World to See”

Members of the Civil Rights movement made heavy use of visual imagery in spreading awareness of their cause, from television to movies, magazines, newspapers, and posters. Experience the “For All the World to See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights,” exhibition with a firsthand docent-guided tour to get a fuller understanding of this critical period through this fascinating lens. Free. 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. African American History and Culture Museum.

Wednesday, August 31 Let’s Eat!

The Museum of the American Indian is home to one of the most unique restaurants in D.C.: Mitsitam Cafe, a renowned eatery that provides visitors the chance to sample traditional Native cuisines from five different regions of the Americas. Come meet Mitsitam’s executive chef Richard Hetzler as he discusses and signs copies of The Mitsitam Cafe Cookbook. Free. Noon to 1 p.m. National Portrait Gallery

Thursday, September 1 Apache 8

Watch the remarkable documentary Apache 8, a thrilling account of the all-women firefighter crew from the White Mountain Apache Tribe. The group has fought fires in the Southwestern United States for decades, and the acclaimed film captures both the professional feats and personal challenges these women encounter on a daily basis. Free. 12:30 and 3:30, daily in September except Wednesdays. National Museum of the American Indian

For a complete listing of Smithsonian events and exhibitions visit the goSmithsonian Online Visitors Guide. Additional reporting by Michelle Strange.

The “Spirit of Tuskegee” takes a flight above Moton Field, the plane’s original home during World War II, in Tuskegee, Alabama. Photo courtesy of National Museum of African American History and Culture

This past Tuesday afternoon, after a month long trip across the country with several stops at air shows and air fields along the way, Matt Quy landed his “Spirit of Tuskegee” World War II era Stearman biplane at Andrews Air Force Base near Washington, D.C. The 35-year-old Air Force captain purchased the open-cockpit, Stearman PT-13D, used to train African American pilots known as the Tuskegee Airmen from 1944 to 1946, at an auction six years ago, restored it and has now donated it to the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

We here at the ATM blog have been following the story of this plane quite closely. Smithsonian magazine columnist Owen Edwards wrote, in early July, about his thrilling flight with Quy in the plane over Northern California and the history of the plane. At the end of July, Edwards reported on Quy’s month-long journey from Lincoln, California, to Washington, D.C., to fly the plane to the Smithsonian. The pilot did not take a direct route, but instead stopped at places like the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and Moton Field, the plane’s original home during World War II, in Tuskegee, Alabama. In both places, original Tuskegee Airmen were able to view it. So, in a sense, the plane’s arrival in Washington feels like an end to an interesting story.

“Watching the plane land at Andrews was a relief on one level—to know that the plane had reached the end of its journey safe and sound,” says NMAAHC curator Paul Gardullo. “But it is also a beginning of a new life for the plane, that we can share with millions of people for generations to come.”

The museum timed the arrival of the plane with the Tuskegee Airmen’s National Convention, being held at the Gaylord Resort in National Harbor, a convention center outside of Washington. About 40 original Tuskegee Airmen and hundreds of other members of the group attended to celebrate the 70th anniversary of their first training sessions in the summer of 1941. On Wednesday evening, Quy flew the plane over National Harbor for some of the airmen to see. “We flew right over National Harbor and actually did a 360 degree turn, so we could really get everyone a nice view of the plane,” says Quy. “It was pretty memorable.”

Gardullo says that for the airmen who saw it, it was a powerful trigger for memories. They reminisced about their time in service and were interested in hearing about how the plane has been used since. ”We knew it was symbolically important to give these men a chance to see a plane that they actually flew in action one last time before going on display for the American people at the Smithsonian,” says Gardullo.

When I spoke with Quy on Thursday morning, he had just participated in a Youth Day at Andrews Air Force Base, where 500 middle school- and high school-aged kids were invited to see the “Spirit of Tuskegee” and other military aircraft on display. “The Tuskegee airmen are a great role model because they show that if you want something bad enough and you are willing to work hard for it that you can accomplish whatever you want to do,” says Quy. “It was really fun to be able to talk to kids and hopefully make an impression on them.”

Today, the pilot’s plan was to take off from Andrews Air Force Base at about nine o’clock in the morning and land at Dulles Airport an hour or two later, depending on ground delays. Later this month, the plane is expected to be on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, near Dulles, where it will stay for the next few years. When the National Museum of African American History and Culture opens in 2015, the plane will be part of its inaugural exhibitions and remain a permanent part of its collection.

“The ‘Spirit of Tuskegee’ is important because of the window it provides to two crucial stories,” says Gardullo. “First, it allows us to help better tell the story of the Tuskegee Airmen, a pioneering group of African Americans whose contributions were central to the war effort during World War II and whose struggle and perseverance were crucial to ending segregation both in the armed forces and the nation. And, second, it allows us to tell the story of a contemporary Air Force pilot who, in finding, rescuing and renovating this plane, has discovered that this history is not foreign to him, but is deeply connected to his identity as a member of the Armed Services and as an American. It is with and through these stories—past and present—that the National Museum of African American History and Culture works, demonstrating the centrality of African American history and culture to Americans of all backgrounds.”

View a photo gallery from Quy’s flight.

En route to Rock Springs, Wyoming, Matt Quy flew by Pinnacle Rock. Photo by Tina Quy/NMAAHC

When pilots of an earlier era talked about “cross country hops,” the operative word was “hop.” In slow aircraft with limited fuel capacity, they flew from airport to airport, covering a distance in a day that modern planes cover in an hour or less.

So it was with Captain Matt Quy, who in his Spirit of Tuskegee Stearman biplane, is on a journey across the United States to deliver his historic aircraft to the National Museum of African American History and Culture. The museum will open on the National Mall in 2015 and the aircraft will become a tribute to the Tuskegee Airman who flew in it.

Quy took off from Lincoln, CA, just after sunrise on July 9, in a temporary mini-formation with a friend in another Stearman. His pal peeled off and went home, and Quy continued eastward toward the snow covered Sierra Nevada mountains with a flight plan that has taken him to the Air Force Academy in Colorado, where Quy spent time with cadets and with eight Tuskegee Airmen. Then, he flew on to his home state of Minnesota for three air shows as well as meetings with Boy Scouts, Civil Air Patrol members, and community groups.

Matt Quy speaks before a student group in Minnesota. Photo by Tina Quy/NMAAHC

As of today, July 27, the intrepid captain is in his fourth day at what some have called “the mother of all airshows” in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. “It’s been great being here,” he said in a telephone conversation. “Everybody who sees the plane seems to appreciate what it represents.” One visitor to the show with a special appreciation for the Stearman was Lt. Col. James Warren, one of the most renowned of the original Tuskegee Airmen. Matt wasn’t able to give the colonel a ride in a plane he may well have flown because, as he points out, “Just now this is the busiest airport in the world, with several thousand airplanes on the ground. It took me half an hour to cross the active runways when I arrived.”

There has been the expected storm-dodging, but the seven-decade old plane has performed well, according to Quy, having reached 10,500 feet climbing over the Rockies. “We had a minor maintenance issue a few days ago,” he said, “but other than that the flight has been trouble free.”

Tomorrow Matt and his plane will leave for Tuskegee, Alabama, where the Stearman spent its youth as a trainer for America’s first black military fliers. And then on to Washington, DC, with a planned landing on August 2.

Weather permitting, of course.

Owen Edwards is a freelance writer and author of the book Elegant Solutions. Each month in Smithsonian magazine, he selects one artifact from among the Smithsonian Institution’s 23 million and tells its story.

Scavengers play Pheon. Photo by Rebecca Reed, American Art Museum

Friday July 15 Discover the Inca Road

This Friday the American Indian Museum is offering an inside look into the Inca Road, the most extensive and advanced system of transportation in pre-Columbian South America. Extending from modern-day Ecuador to Argentina, the road covered an estimated 25,000 miles and now visitors can learn about the historical trail. Come to suite 4018 on the 4th level of the museum at 12:30 to take part in a series of realtime discussions with members of a multinational research team of engineers and archeologists located in the city of Cusco and the Ancash region of Peru, where they study the construction of the ancient South American highway. Listen as members of the team detail experiences and discoveries from their work. The two-hour event is free and is one of four broadcasts that make up the series.

Saturday July 16 Scavenger Hunt at American Art

Have a little fun this Saturday by going to the American Art Museum to play the scavenger hunt game, Pheon. Sign up at the Luce Foundation Center, 3rd Floor  west wing of the museum, between 2:30 and 4. Work as a team as you try to navigate your way through this multimedia scavenger hunt. Test your ingenuity as you explore the collections, create objects and use your cell phone to text answers to clues that lead you to the finish line. Be sure to wear comfortable shoes and come prepared with a sense of adventure and a text messaging enabled cell phone. This event is free and is fun for the whole family so take part in Pheon between 2:30 and 6 Saturday afternoon.

Sunday July 17 Explore the New American History Exhibit

There is a new exhibit at the American History Museum, join staff this Sunday as they provide an introduction and overview of For All the World to See, Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights. Come to African American History and Culture gallery located on the East Wing of the second floor of the museum between 10:30 and 1:45. Discover the way visual images shaped and influenced the Civil Rights movement, transforming the fight for racial equality and justice. Listen as museum facilitators explain the framework of the exhibit and answer visitors’ questions. This is a free event and is appropriate for all ages.

For a complete listing of Smithsonian Institution events and exhibits see the GoSmithsonian Visitors Guide.

All Power to the People: The Story of the Black Panther Party, 1970 Photo: Collection of Civil Rights Archive/CADVC-UMBC

If you think you know the history of the civil rights movement in the United States, “For All The World To See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights,” a new exhibit at the National Museum of African American History and Culture gallery in the American History Museum, encourages you to take another look.

“The vast majority, if not virtually all exhibitions on the civil rights movement dealing with visual materials almost exclusively are about the way photographs documented the movement—that’s pretty much what civil rights exhibitions have been for the past 25 years,” says curator Maurice Berger. “This exhibition asks a far different question.”

And that question, Berger says, is how visual culture—television, film, magazines, newspapers, toys, pamphlets, posters—was used, both by leaders of the movement and activists, as well as by everyday black Americans, to change prevailing ideas about race in the United States.

Divided into five sections, the exhibition takes visitors from the stereotypical images of blacks into which the civil rights movement was born, to those created to foster a sense of black pride and accomplishment. The third section, “Let The World See What I’ve Seen” : Evidence and Persuasion, examines how powerful depictions of the struggle helped change public perception, buoyed by materials related to the Emmett Till case. The exhibit continues through the exploration of how entertainment television dealt with black performers and the subject of race and concludes with a showcase of visual artifacts of daily life, from family snapshots to advertising campaigns and including campaign materials from the Black Panther Party.

“It’s one of the rare instances where an exhibition is able to make the claim that a political movement took advantage in an extraordinary way of the new technologies of seeing and representing the world,” Berger says.

Some of the highlights of this multimedia exhibition include: historic footage of Jackie Robinson’s first game in the major leagues, a look at the history of black magazines, clips from groundbreaking T.V. documentaries and shows, a touch screen story of the Emmett Till case and photographs documenting the movement taken by Gordon Parks, Roy DeCarava and Carl Van Vechten, among others.

In addition to the exhibition, there is also an illustrated companion book and a comprehensive online version of the exhibition. Berger, who began his research six years ago, calls the process a “very sustained six-year period of intensive research, archive building, exhibition organizing and writing of the book,” the culmination of which debuted in May of last year with the first stop on the six-venue national tour. Co-organized by the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, this is the exhibit’s third stop.

“There have been claims that pictures matter, that images matter, that they can make a difference,” Berger says. “‘For All The World To See’ is living proof in so many ways that pictures—even things as ordinary as a snapshot— can truly change the way people understand issues and ideas in the United States and in the world.”

See “For All The World To See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights” at the National Museum of African American History and Culture gallery in the National Museum of American History through November 2011.

The author riding in the Stearman with pilot Matt Quy. Photo courtesy of Tina Quy

Having written the Smithsonian magazine column The Object at Hand for several years, I’ve been able to tell the stories behind a wonderful array of fascinating things in the many collections of the Institution’s museums and galleries. But the things I write about are carefully preserved and protected for the good of history, so I am not allowed to lay my ink-stained fingers on them.

Until now. A few hundred feet above the rolling hills of Northern California all that changed.

So, there I sat, in the front seat of an open-cockpit, tandem seat World War II era Stearman PT-13D biplane, on the tarmac of a civilian airport in Lincoln, California, fanned in the 99-degree heat by the prop of the ten cylinder Lycoming radial engine. In the seat behind me, at the controls, was Matt Quy (pronounce Kwai), a 35 year-old Air Force captain on active duty with a combat reconnaissance squadron at a nearby base. Quy bought a crashed plane at auction six years ago, discovered that it had been used as a trainer for the African American flyers who have come to be known as the Tuskegee Airmen and decided to take it back to its original condition as a tribute to America’s first black military pilots.

Back from a tour in Afghanistan and stationed with his wife Tina in Louisiana, Quy began devoting the lion’s share of his off-duty hours to meticulously restoring Stearman number 18303. He and an aircraft mechanic friend in Houston, Robbie Vajdos, repaired the pre-auction damage that had occurred when the plane’s engine failed and a landing on a road ended with a head-on into a tree. To give due credit, Tina took a hand in some of the work.

“Luckily for me,” Quy says, “after the war many of these planes became crop dusters, so there are still parts available.”

Pilot Matt Quy. Photo by Tina Quy

Quy recounts that he’d wanted a Stearman biplane since he was a kid in Minnesota. “My family lived near a grass landing strip, and there was a guy with a Stearman who dragged advertising signs. He’d come right over our house pulling these banners, and I was hooked.”

Restoring the plane became both a labor of love and an act of homage to the men who had trained in it. The bright blue, red and yellow paint scheme recreates the wartime colors, and Quy has used the plane, which took to the air again three years ago, as a way of educating young generations about the Tuskegee pilots, appearing at air shows to tell the story of the African-American flyers. He has met many of the surviving pilots who flew the Stearman trainers, and on the lid of the plane’s luggage compartment there are Magic Marker signatures of many of them.

As we sat at the end of the runway to build up the old engine’s revs, the pilot of a sleek business jet radioed to ask if he could go ahead of us, since he’d just been cleared by the Lincoln tower. Capt. Quy waved him on with a thumbs up, and the jet’s pilot radioed back: “Thanks, Gentlemen…I sure would like to trade places with you.”

I wouldn’t have traded places for the world. After all, a jet is just a jet, but a Stearman biplane is…well, it’s living history. And fun! With four wide lift surfaces, the plane seemed as buoyant as a kid’s kite (and just as magical to look at). Quy, an experienced aerobatic pilot, gave me the thrill of “barnstorming,” taking the plane down to about 100 feet over the golden fields and skimming up and over the eucalyptus trees lining a creek fed by the snow melt off the Sierras. A coyote rushed out of the brush down below and looked up in astonishment. Or could it have been envy? Given enough gasoline, I’d have gladly stayed in that wonderfully reclaimed beauty until dark.

This was likely the Stearman’s final penultimate flight out of Lincoln Airport. On Saturday, July 9, Quy will climb into the cockpit with a friend, and take off from Lincoln a nearby Air Force base en route to Washington, DC, where the plane will be turned over to the curators of the new National Museum of African American History and Culture. It will be put on display when the museum opens on the Mall in 2015 and will remain a vivid, perpetual tribute to the Tuskegee Airmen. On his way, he will stop in Colorado, at the Air Force Academy, where eight Tuskegee veterans will be waiting to salute him (and vice versa).

Quy admits parting with the plane will not be easy, but he has already bought another Stearman, and with it he will create a second educational project, this one devoted to the pilots who became prisoners of war or went missing during the Vietnam War.

– by Owen Edwards

Owen Edwards is a freelance writer and author of the book Elegant Solutions. Each month in Smithsonian magazine, he selects one artifact from among the Smithsonian Institution’s 23 million and tells its story.

UPDATE, September 19, 2011: This post previously attributed the photographs to author Owen Edwards, the photos were taken by Tina Quy. We regret the error.

George Clinton performing in May of 2007. Photo courtesy of Flickr user Spector1.

“Oh, pretty good. Went and did a little bit of fishing yesterday,” said George Clinton, chuckling slyly in his oh-so-raspy voice on the other end of the telephone line, when I asked him how he was feeling.  And it was exactly how I expected the influential funkster to sound. Though the 69-year-old Clinton was recently hospitalized at the end of May, he’s apparently ready to give up the funk again and resume touring.

The colorfully-coiffed George Clinton is best known as the ringleader, singer, songwriter and producer of the Parliament and Funkadelic bands during the 1970s and early 1980s. The two groups had an incestuous relationship, sharing and swapping players, and both were known for their influential groove-based funk, elaborate stage shows and costumed members. Clinton followed that up with a solo career, and still records and performs with various backing band incarnations. The influence of his music carries on, often serving as building blocks for different genres, as he is among the most sampled artists in hip-hop today.

Earlier this May, Clinton donated a replica of his stage prop extraordinaire, the Mothership, to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC), which will open on the National Mall in 2015. The original Mothership was a life-sized, smoke-spewing spaceship-for-one with flashing lights that transported Clinton down to the stage during Parliament-Funkadelic shows during the late 1970s and very early 1980s. “It’s a large iconic object [that] resonates with so many people,” said Dwandalyn R. Reece, the museum’s curator of music history. “Not only the group itself and George Clinton, but also the message. . . .This whole concept of being in outer space, in terms of liberation and living in a different level of consciousness.”

The initial idea for the prop came from Parliament’s classic 1976 album Mothership Connection. Instead of an unrelated collection of singles, there was an underlying narrative theme to the record, incorporating characters such as “Starchild,” an alien funk messiah who has come to spread the funk. “After West Side Story, Sgt. Pepper’s, Hair, Tommy–after those—they made them like rock operas,” said Clinton. “We wanted a funk opera. And so I figured that characters live longer than rock stars do.”

The Mothership served as “Starchild’s” mode of interstellar transport, and the original version made its first appearance at a 1976 Parliament gig at the Municipal Auditorium in New Orleans. On that tour and future tours the ship would light up and descend upon the stage from 40 feet in the air like a UFO, spewing smoke. Upon its landing, George Clinton would emerge in full regalia, strutting out as “Starchild,” (or on later tours, sometimes as “Dr. Funkenstein”) often dressed in furs, sunglasses and carrying a cane, like a space pimp ready to spread the funk to those who needed it.

Audiences ate it up. “A lot of cats just came to see the spaceship,” said Parliament-Funkadelic guitarist Mike Hampton in a 1978 Rolling Stone interview. “It’s hard to think you’re doing something musically when you’re competing with that.

And even the band was impressed with the prop. “It was phenomenal, man. You couldn’t describe it,” recalled keyboardist Bernie Worrell to The Washington Post. “I can play and not look at the keys. I watched it every time it would come down.”

The elaborate stage show and costumes, however, came with a price, and by 1981, increasing debts and dissatisfaction among band members, among other things, led to a breakdown in the band and a period of inactivity. Some of the group’s equipment was brought back to Washington, DC and placed in storage, but with no revenue coming in, it soon had to be sold.

One of the group’s promoters, Brooks Kirkendall, was forced to store the Mothership in his mother’s garage in Clinton, MD. After six months she demanded that it the Mothership be removed. Unable to make contact with any band members, including Clinton, Kirkendall loaded the Mothership into a U-Haul in 1982 with the help of a co-worker and left it at a junkyard in Seat Pleasant. The Mothership has been off the radar ever since.

The replica that Clinton donated this past May is a 1,200-pound aluminum hunk of funk that was constructed in the 1990s. It had been sitting in his recording studio back in Florida. But is it as hip on that ship as the original? “It’s the exact same,” says Clinton. “Same blueprint, same everything!” And he thinks it’s quite appropriate to have the NMAAHC serve as his Mothership’s final resting place. “Our music’s the DNA for the hip-hop and dance music in general,” says Clinton. “Smithsonian is a fitting place for the spaceship.”

There is much to celebrate in the month of May—Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, Mother’s Day, as well as a number of anniversaries marking special events in our nation’s history. On today, we turn our focus, slightly, from remembering the Civil War to acknowledging the civil rights movement in the United States, as we remember the Freedom Rides, celebrating its 50th anniversary today.

In the 1960s, racial inequality was legislated through separate eating establishments, drinking facilities, sleeping accommodations, modes of travel and educational institutions, as blacks and whites lived segregated lives, in accordance with the laws of the land. In 1960, the United States Supreme Court outlawed racial segregation in public transportation in Boynton v. Virginia, citing discrimination as a violation of the the Interstate Commerce Act. The decision, which made it illegal to segregate restaurants, waiting rooms and terminals serving buses that crossed state lines, did little to change the status quo. So on May 4, 1961, a group of courageous men and women, the first of many, set out from Washington, D.C., heading south, to challenge local enforcement of the law.

Organized by the Congress of  Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) among others, the Freedom Rides were built around the concept of nonviolent resistance. Hailing from a cross section of the U.S. population, the riders were an overwhelmingly young group, comprised of blacks, whites, men, women, students, clergy—all committed to cause of racial equality. As they traveled deeper into the Jim Crow South, they were met with increased hostility and violence. While attempting to desegregate whites-only waiting rooms and restaurants at bus terminals, they were assaulted, beaten and arrested; their buses attacked and even firebombed.

News and photographs of the violence spread and others joined the movement, swelling the numbers of volunteers to more than 400. They also staged sit-ins at segregated lunch counters and businesses. The National Guard was eventually assigned to some buses to prevent violence, but the regularly scheduled rides continued for seven months. After the arrests of some volunteers for breach of peace, instead of violating segregation laws, the Freedom Riders employed the “jail, no bail” strategy in an effort to clog the prison system. Many would later fight for years to appeal their convictions.

Finally, on November 6, 1961, spurred by a petition from Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy,  an order by the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) went into effect, which mandated tougher new regulations, including stiff fines, which led to the  eventual end of segregated bus facilities. Many Freedom Riders would go on to become teachers, ministers, lawyers, journalists, Peace Corps volunteers and politicians. Some, continue to share their stories and continue to fight—nonviolently—for equality.

Today, we remember their sacrifice.

Read more about what happened to some of the Freedom Riders in and since 1961 and check out a photo gallery by veteran magazine editor Eric Etheridge, author of Breach of Peace: Portraits of the 1961 Mississippi Freedom Riders, where he juxtaposes some of their mug shots with more recent photos.

On Thursday, May 12, the film Freedom Riders will be screened at 6 PM as part of the Smithsonian Resident Associate Program. Tickets are already sold out, but you can call (202) 633-3030 to be placed on the Wait List. Additional tickets may become available or additional sessions may be added.

All Smithsonian Institution museums and the National Zoo are Open. Photo by Eric Long

All Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo are open.

Don’t miss out on all the events and happenings, all scheduled as planned. Tarantula feedings at the Natural History Museum. A special tour of the Kinsey Collections at American History. An Earth Day celebration at the American Art Museum.

And here’s a list of all the exhibitions that are on view.  For the first time, the Freer Gallery’s renowned Peacock Room has been restored to its appearance in 1908, when the museum’s founder Charles Lang Freer used it to organize and display more than 250 ceramics from all over Asia. The new exhibition, The Peacock Room Comes to America, debuts today.

Other don’t-miss exhibitions and landmark Smithsonian artifacts like the Hope Diamond, Julia Child’s kitchen, the Ruby Slippers, The Wright Flyer, The First Ladies exhibition can be found at the following Smithsonian museum locations:

• The Smithsonian Castle
• The Carousel on the National Mall
• The Ripley Center and International Gallery
• The National Museum of American History
• The National Museum of Natural History
• The National Air and Space Museum
• The Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia
• The Smithsonian American Art Museum
• The Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
• The National Portrait Gallery
• The Freer and Sackler Galleries
• The Hirshhorn Museum
• The African Art Museum
• The National Museum of the American Indian
• The National Postal Museum
• The National Zoo
• The Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum in New York City
• The George Gusav Heye Center in New York City

This weekend marks a special time for Smithsonian visitors and the Institution’s spokesperson Linda St. Thomas expressed her delight that the museums were all open for business this weekend:  “People have planned for months, or a year or more, for their spring visits to Washington, which always includes visits to the museums and the Zoo. If it were up to us, we would never shut down. That’s why we are only closed one day a year—Christmas Day.”

Of course spring time is also is presenting Smithsonian photographer Eric Long with some of the most exquisite visual opportunities, enjoy this gallery before gearing up to head out.

This week, take advantage of an opportunity to have a Smithsonian curator take a close look at a prized possession and let you know how to best take care of it. Ruel P. Tolman Examining Art Work (ca. 1935). Image courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution Archives

Monday, November 15: It’s cold outside — take in a movie.

It’s a good day to take in an IMAX movie—and your entertainment options are plentiful. Theaters are located in the Natural History Museum, the Air and Space Museum and the Udvar-Hazy Center. In addition to short films—like “Dinosaurs” and “Legends of Flight”—you can catch a screening of the full-length feature “The Wildest Dream: Conquest of Everest.” Check out this site for a full film schedule and to buy tickets online. Tickets may also be purchased at the IMAX box office at the museums.

Tuesday, November 16: The Anthology of Rap

In this event sponsored by the African American History Museum, learn about the political, social and cultural currency that rap music has all over the world. This panel discussion will be led by hip hop artist and actor Common, rapper and producer Kurtis Blow, as Adam Bradley and Andrew DuBois who are the editors of the new book The Anthology of Rap. Please note this event will take place at the Lincoln Theater on U St. Free. African American History Museum, 7:00 PM.

Wednesday, November 17: Native Theater: Green Grow the Lilacs by Lynn Riggs

Lynn Riggs was a playwright of Cherokee descent whose Pulitzer Prize-nominated play Green Grow the Lilacs was later adapted into the landmark stage musical Oklahoma! His works are rarely revived, but today you will have an opportunity to see the United States Naval Academy theater troupe’s touring production of Green Grow the Lilacs. This performance repeats on November 18. Not able to be here in person? Worry not: this performance will be webcast live. Free. American Indian Museum, 7:30-9:30 PM

Thursday, November 18: Ask Us: Curatorial Clinic

Everyone has pieces in their homes that they hope to preserve for future generations—but making sure those prized possessions survive can sometimes be tricky. Come on over to the African Art Museum, which is providing conservation and curatorial clinics. You can ask Smithsonian experts about how to properly care for your collections. Free, but registration is required. Call 202-633-4640 to set up your appointment today. There is a limit of two objects per visit. African Art Museum, 11:00 AM-1:00 PM

Friday, November 19: Dialogue: Scientific and Religious Perspectives on Human Evolution

Dr. Rick Potts, curator of the David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins, and Connie Bertka, research scientist and lecturer at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, discuss the relationship between scientific and religious perspectives in light of the latest research on human evolution. Free. Natural History Museum, 3:00-4:00 PM.

For updates on all exhibitions and events, visit our companion site goSmithsonian.com