O Say Can You See?

A no-brainer collaboration: "Music for the World of Tomorrow"

Every time I consider quitting Facebook, a surprising connection keeps me hanging on. That’s how “Music for The World of Tomorrow” became part of the Lemelson Center’s National Inventors’ Month festival, held August 7-8.

Local musicians Ryan and Hays Holladay are Bluebrain. In addition to performing and making records, Bluebrain organizes and stages interactive projects in and around Washington.

After learning about Bluebrain’s innovative work through their Facebook page, I asked Ryan Holladay if the duo wanted to develop a performance for this year's Lemelson Center’s National Inventors’ Month festival, themed around music and sound.

Enthusiastically, Ryan proposed that Bluebrain score a silent film to be screened at the museum. I suggested we start with something from the museum’s Edward J. Orth Memorial Archives of the World’s Fair, 1939-1940, due both to its “eye candy” quality and the role of world’s fairs as showcases for invention and innovation. Archivist Wendy Shay introduced us to the Orth collection’s silent, home-movie footage shot at the 1939-40 New York World’s Fair, a celebration of “The World of Tomorrow.”

The footage is stunning. Recorded originally on Kodachrome film, it has retained its vibrant color and reveals the staggering scale of the Fair. Visitors can be seen meandering through gardens, posing in funhouse-style mirrors, resting by fountains, walking arm in arm, and consulting their maps (paper, not Google).

Amazingly, these films were shot by an amateur, at a time when 16 millimeter cameras were far from ubiquitous; capturing this international event on film was forward-thinking in and of itself.

In addition to revelrous patriotic performances, the World’s Fair footage that Bluebrain selected shows construction of the Trylon and Perisphere, Eleanor and Franklin Delano Roosevelt in color, the Parachute Jump (later moved to Coney Island), synchronized swimmers, dancers, and divers at the Aquacade, and the vast exhibit structures sponsored by Russia, Germany, Italy, and corporations like General Electric. This was a World’s Fair about better living through consumer products.

I invited curator Larry Bird to record a video introduction to precede each Bluebrain performance. Bird placed the World’s Fair in its historical context and told his colorful story of meeting Edward Orth, “an extraordinary collector” of World’s Fair memorabilia, including the films now in the Archives Center.

“Music for The World of Tomorrow,” the culmination of Bluebrain’s work with the Lemelson Center, brought to light a compilation of archival footage that Orth himself may never have seen, according to Bird, because he apparently lacked a film projector. The combined film screening and live, musical performance was repeated four times in Carmichael Auditorium on August 7 and 8 and attended by local and out-of-town visitors of all ages.

Ryan (left) and Hays (right) Holladay performing at the National Museum of American History.

I felt completely energized by the vision and enthusiasm that Bluebrain contributed to the National Inventors’ Month festival, and I hope the museum can do even more cross-disciplinary collaborations with local artists and musicians. Do you have ideas for future programs? Please share them in the comments!

Stay tuned for a blog post by Ryan Holladay, sharing Bluebrain’s perspective on creating “Music for The World of Tomorrow.” For a five-minute video of the performance visit the Lemelson Center’s YouTube page  or watch below.

Amanda Murray is Project Assistant for the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the National Museum of American History.

An old coat and a ping pong ball = Kermit?

Just how did an old coat and a ping pong ball contribute to what would become a global phenomenon? Add a whole heap of imagination, more than a little pinch of creative genius, as well as a generous portion of love and enthusiasm . . . and there you have Kermit, who along with his chums from the TV series Sam and Friends helped introduce the world to the wonderful world of Jim Henson and what would become Muppets.

Sam and Friends

Before I go any further I should probably explain that the original Kermit from Sam and Friends was painstakingly made from a green coat discarded by Jim Henson’s mother and his eyes were each one half of a ping pong ball. It was back in 1955 when Jim Henson’s Sam and Friends debuted on local Washington, D.C., station WRC-TV. It featured a cast of zany characters including a French rat named Pierre, an abstract snake called Icky Gunk, a humanoid by the name of Moldy Hay, the purple skull who loves to eat celery who went by Yorick, as well as a monstrous furry creature called Mushmellon. These names may not be instantly recognizable to today’s generation but when you find out that Mushmellon bears a resemblance to Oscar the Grouch and that Yorick was a pre-cursor to hungry beings like Cookie Monster, you begin to get the picture. It was Sam and Friends that began the Muppet phenomenon and which grew into a world-wide love affair.

Characters from the TV show “Sam and Friends,” ca. 1956/57. Left to right: Kermit (original), Mold, Yorick, Harry the Hipster & Sam. Courtesy of The Jim Henson Company and The Muppets Studio LLC.

For me personally, the love of all things Henson began rather later in life. I grew up in the U.K., and I vividly remember watching Sesame Street on television, usually while eating my lunch. I loved Big Bird and The Count but my family would frequently compare me to Oscar the Grouch; not for a love of trash I must add, but for my tendency (back then) to occasionally be less than sweetness and light. After being compared to a grumpy, green garbage dweller, my viewing tailed off, and it wasn’t until I met my husband some years later that the enthusiasm returned.

Jim Henson poses with characters from the TV show “Sam and Friends,” ca. 1956/57. Left to right: Harry the Hipster, Sam, Jim Henson, Kermit (original), Yorick. Courtesy of The Jim Henson Company and The Muppets Studio LLC.

My husband Jon and his family had far more Muppet mania in their household. Both Jon and his sister Dawn grew up with all aspects of Henson Productions firmly embedded in their childhood viewing. They loved Sesame Street, The Muppet Show, the Muppet movies, Fraggle Rock and the more unusual Henson projects like the The Dark Crystal and the Labyrinth film. The Muppet’s Christmas Carol was an unbreakable annual family tradition in the Birkbeck household. (When Jon found out I was going to be working on this project he was so jealous he almost turned as green as Kermit the frog himself!)

So thanks to his influence I began to get reacquainted with Henson’s programs and saw, once again, how the uniqueness of all the characters provided such appeal for both children and adults alike. I admit that I found The Dark Crystal far too scary, even more frightening than the opening sequence of The Incredible Hulk television series—and that used to cause me to hide behind the sofa in terror.

Kermit the Frog. This Muppet was made in 1969 and has been in the museum’s collections for three decades.

Research helped me to discover aspects of the Henson puppet family that I had never heard of before. Sam and Friends was completely new to me, so it was especially exciting to find out all about the original Kermit. More of a lizard than a frog, he has rounded feet and, at this point, he does not yet have his trademark collar. He is less of a vibrant green than Kermit the Frog, although both puppets are about the same size and are operated in the same way. It was a fun discovery to find out from curator Dwight Blocker Bowers that the original Kermit’s puppeteer cavity is actually made from a pair of jeans!

Attending the donation ceremony was a chance for me to see the characters in the flesh. Or should that be in the cloth? They were a lot smaller than I imagined, but perfectly formed, each one with such a captivating expression, so colorful and full of life. I almost expected them to start moving and to join in the conversations! The original Kermit, arm in arm with title character Sam, looked extremely happy to be coming home to D.C. They all did, even the more grouchy looking Mushmellon looked content as they faced the numerous cameras and journalists who had come to see them.

Jane Henson—Jim’s wife and an integral part of the Sam and Friends crew—was there to officially donate the characters to the museum and she talked about them all like old friends, which of course to her, they are. She told us how the puppets were made by Jim Henson when he was in his teens or early twenties—apart from Mushmellon, which was constructed by Jane herself. Watching the donation ceremony, I began to feel like Sam, Kermit, Mushmellon, and all the other characters were now like friends to me too, and that they would soon have a whole host of new chums with all the people who come to visit them at their new home.

Editor’s note: Sam and Friends puppets will go on public display at the National Museum of American History in November. The Sesame Street Kermit the Frog is already on view on the museum’s third floor.

Lisa Birkbeck is a volunteer in the Office of Public Affairs at the National Museum of American History.

Abbey Lincoln, singer emancipator (August 6, 1930-August 14, 2010)

Singer/composer Abbey Lincoln drew strength from emancipation–her own and the liberation of others fighting for social justice. When she passed away August 14, in New York City, the world acknowledged her artistry and her activism, most notably the seminal, civil rights jazz opus We Insist! Freedom Now Suite performed with former husband, jazz drummer Max Roach.

Abbey Lincoln with old friends (and fellow NEA Jazz Masters) Roy Haynes (left) and Wynton Marsalis (right) at the 2008 NEA Jazz Masters Reunion Lunch. Photo courtesy Katja von Schuttenbach.

“There’s no such thing as jazz, there’s only a song.” Ms. Lincoln made this declaration during a 1996 Jazz Oral History conducted by the Smithsonian Institution, and it was featured in a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Jazz Masters Moments radio segment. She’d grown up during an era when music was freer, unencumbered by rigid musical categories. “There was space for all forms,” she said, allowing a singer/storyteller to unleash an original instrument.

Jazz musician Max Roach, New York City, 1950. Herman Leonard Photographic Collection, Archives Center, National Museum of American History. Mr. Leonard was a legendary jazz photographer who died at age 87, on August 14, the same day Abbey Lincoln passed. He was a featured guest at the museum’s 2006 Jazz Appreciation Month Launch where he also toured the Archives Center which preserves an oral history of him and more than 150 of his jazz photos.

In 1972, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History initiated the Jazz Oral History Project with NEA funding and has continued to build external partnerships to capture and preserve this invaluable cultural history for the public. The need for an oral history program at the Smithsonian grew out of the recognition that a fleeting opportunity exists to record and document the knowledge and recollections of the generation of musicians who created the music we know as jazz. The museum’s Archives Center currently maintains more than 200 jazz oral histories developed with support from NEA, the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund, and the Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation. In 2006, the NEA partnered with the museum to create the NEA “Jazz Masters” Oral History Program, an initiative that has resulted in 26 jazz oral histories, including the one with Abbey Lincoln. Scores of NEA Jazz Masters have yet to have their personal stories captured and disseminated free-of-charge for use by researchers, teachers, and the interested public for generations to come.

Jazz and a hardscrabble life of rural poverty informed Abbey Lincoln’s creative voice and even influenced the unique stage name given to her by her friend and manager, lyricist Bob Russell. (The name was created by symbolically joining Westminster Abbey and Abraham Lincoln.)

Born Anna Marie Wooldridge in Chicago, August 6, 1930, Abbey Lincoln was the tenth of 12 children raised in rural Michigan during the Depression. It was an era when jazz was America’s popular music, Jim Crow segregation was the law of the land, and her family lived on wild rabbit provided by neighbors who were hunters.

She told the Smithsonian that hearing early jazz recordings from artists like Coleman Hawkins, Frank Sinatra, Sarah Vaughn, and vocalist Billie Holiday transformed her life. And from those musical beginnings and the nurturing by jazz artists she developed her signature as a singer and a composer.

 
(Left) Frank Sinatra, New York City, 1956. Herman Leonard Photographic Collection, Archives Center, National Museum of American History. (Right) Billie Holiday, Washington, D.C., ca. 1940s. Scurlock Studio Records, ca. 1905-1994, Archives Center, National Museum of American History.

Ms. Lincoln also enjoyed critical acclaim in Hollywood. In 1956 she appeared in a Jayne Mansfield comedy, The Girl Can’t Help It, gaining notoriety by appearing in a dress worn by Marilyn Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. She co-starred with Sidney Poitier and Beau Bridges in For Love of Ivy, and played the mother of the young Bleek Gilliam in Spike Lee’s jazz film Mo’ Better Blues. But the film role that melded Ms. Lincoln’s star power with her civil rights activism was the 1964 independent film Nothing But a Man, where she appeared as the long-suffering wife of Ivan Dixon, a Southern black man fighting for self-respect and human dignity. The film was deemed “culturally significant” by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

 

Credit: Audio clips used with permission from NEA Jazz Moments which was created with archival material from the Jazz Masters Oral Histories Program Collection (Archives Center, National Museum of American History) in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts.

More about the Jazz Oral History Program
In 1980, the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey, became the administrator and repository of the 122 taped and transcribed interviews collected before the initial NEAsupport for the project ended in 1984.

In 1992, a new collaboration reactivated the project and expanded its scope as the Jazz Oral History Program. The Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund awarded a grant to the Smithsonian Institution to create “America’s Jazz Heritage, A Partnership of the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund and the Smithsonian Institution.” This partnership supported a ten-year national jazz celebration that ended in 2002 and included the touring exhibitions Louis Armstrong – A Cultural legacy, Latin Jazz- La Combinacion Perfecta, Jazz Age in Paris, and Beyond Category – The Musical Genius of Duke Ellington as well as performances, educational programs, recordings, special events, publications, radio programs, and the Jazz Oral History Program, located at the National Museum of American History.

The Jazz Oral History Program also collects interviews with other performance artists, relatives, and business associates. Their accounts, which both corroborate and conflict with those of the musicians, are integral to a history that remains primarily an oral tradition. The insights gained from the ideas, aspirations, lives, and times shared in these stories are invaluable to the establishment of a comprehensive permanent record of American musical and cultural history.

Joann Stevens is the program director for Jazz Appreciation Month at the National Museum of American History.

An Idle Record of an Idle Summer

Ah, the joy to be savored in a relaxed, idle summer evening—ice-cold lemonade in hand, the condensation dripping off your glass, fireflies blinking in the humid dusk. In all the scheduling and running around we do, it seems there could be no greater plan for a summer day than to have no plan at all. We tend think of our hectic pace as a modern-world ill, but within the museum’s Photographic History Collection is an incredible album from 1909 that shows we actually have much more in common with the ailments and summer-time antidotes from a century-old Americana than we might otherwise assume.

Title page of An Idle Record of an Idle Summer.

Indeed, this leather-bound album, An Idle Record of an Idle Summer, documents a summer spent relaxing. Creating it, however, was no idle feat. Those who have put together a journal or album know the time and effort it takes to do so. An Idle Record is a lengthy, handwritten personal account of a vacation spent in and around Atlantic City, New Jersey, illustrated with 232 platinum photographs of various sizes that are pasted in the pages. The photographs often depict the exact scene the author describes in writing. A husband-and-wife team who coyly hid their identity and called themselves “The Culprits” created the album. The wife was the (often humorous and always intelligent) author while the husband functioned as the dedicated and talented amateur photographer. I use the word amateur here in the true meaning of the word. His prints show that he loved the medium and chose to develop and craft his own negatives and prints instead of sending them off to Kodak, which by then had whipped the world into a photographic frenzy with manufactured printing and developing. He uses platinum as a light-sensitive agent in his prints instead of the more commonly used silver.

“Twilight on the Meadows”

"A Study of Pipewort and Pussy-toes"

As I read through the album, transcribing it in hopes of publishing the story for easy access, I was delighted to find myself relating to many of the author’s century-old musings. A few of her grievances stood out as especially relevant to modern social issues. For example, in one passage “The Culprits” visit a country farmer. Their complaint is that his farm fresh eggs and butter are twice the city store prices, precisely the major issue people have today with eating local, organic food. Who knew this concern is more than a century old! The author nicknames the farmer “Three Days Gathering”. Apparently the farmer justified his prices by repeating, “Three days’ gathering, three days’ gathering”, meaning his bounty took three days to produce.

“A Crowded Beach in Atlantic City”

“Ice Cream on the Boardwalk”

“In the Surf”

The author also laments the loss of her favorite “flower-hunting” bogs and forests to the proliferation of the automobile and what she sees as the overdevelopment of “building lots” and “Land Improvement Associations”. Imagine what she would think of Atlantic City, its environs, and traffic today if she thought it was overdeveloped in 1909!

There are other light-hearted observations and pastimes “The Culprits” participate in that are still a part of our idle summers. They take in a Phillies vs St. Louis baseball game, stroll the boardwalk, eat a quickly melting ice cream cone, critique passersby, and constantly complain that the weatherman is always wrong. Even in our fast-paced world, some things never change.

Andrea Hackman is a project assistant in the Photographic History Collection at the National Museum of American History.

Treasure hunting

Editor’s Note: Today’s post is written by Harrow Strickland, a middle school teacher and summer teaching associate at the National Museum of American History. If you’re interested in becoming a teaching associate, please email us at Thinkfinity@si.edu for more information.

 

On a random weekday back in April, I was checking my Facebook page when I saw an opportunity to go to the greatest place on EARTH! A K-12 Summer Teaching Associate working at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History was like a siren’s song calling me!

The main focus of my time at the museum was to create something new for teachers. Carrie and Jenny, my colleagues who run the History Explorer program, filtered through my natural chattiness about my classroom teaching to find the one nugget that would become the foundation for my project: a random mention of a novel I use in my classroom suddenly became the focus for building a much bigger and more meaningful set of lessons. The lesson that I created will be posted on History Explorer later this year.

As they sent me different teacher resources to review, I began to realize how much stuff is here, ready, and available for teachers. Not only do they have meaningful objects, but some really smart people have developed creative ways to bring the collection to those of us who can’t bring our students to D.C.History Explorer has wonderful lesson plans found and interactive online exhibitions. I never knew all of this existed and now I can’t wait to share these treasures with other teachers!

The next thing I knew, publishers of the book that I mentioned “Bull Run” were being contacted, and curators were reading the novel to give approval. I was meeting with staff to determine which objects in the vast collection we would be able to use. The first few weeks were filled with rereads, rewrites, combing over with edits and suggestions, and then came the day where the graphic designer presented me with a mock-up of my ideas. (Total nerd moment—you would have thought he’d handed me a box from Tiffany’s, and in my mind it was just like that—only better!)

As I wind down my time here in D.C., I am reflecting on all the things I’ve seen, all the things I’ve learned, and all the people I’ve met. The National Museum of American History is a wonderful organization and the group I was privileged to work with and share office space with are the most welcoming, interesting, and fun people. The curators are knowledgeable and so willing to share. Carrie and Jenny are passionate about making this place and the website accessible for teachers and parents. There are truly Real National Treasures here at this museum and I am thankful I had the opportunity to work with them all. 

This has been the adventure of a lifetime for a small town suburban teacher. I’ve experienced living in an amazing city and working for the most incredible organization dedicated to the “increase and diffusion of knowledge.” James Smithson, the founder, was a wise man. I think he would be pleased to find the people here at the museum are carrying out his mission in 2010. I am so proud to be a tiny part of that mission and will be forever changed for the better by this experience.

Endnote: This summer, Harrow developed a suite of learning materials called “Voices of Bull Run.” The core learning experience focuses on actively reading the historical fiction book Bull Run by Paul Fleishman, then working on one or more assessment projects. Targeted toward 5th through 8th grade students, “Voice of Bull Run” will be available in mid-fall 2010 on Smithsonian’s History Explorer.