While Museums changed their approach during this progressive turn, academic historians were not actively involved in the beginning. John Cotton Dana, founder and curator of the Newark Museum, called for a change in focus for all museums in his 1920 book A Plan for a New Museum: The Kind of Museum It Will Profit a City to Maintain. He stated, “A museum is good only in so far as it is of use.” A museum’s value did not lay in beautiful, rare, and objects from long ago and far away places, but in objects and displays that both reflect the current population and educates them. Marjorie Schwarzer notes, “Museums would do better to create activities that catered to everybody, he (Dana) declared, especially the factory workers who were building …show more content…
This object-based epistemology expanded upon the ideas of earlier museums but now conveyed a level of personalism and usefulness. Their museums reflected the lives of common people, not just great men who did great things. Henry Ford believed “his museum (the Henry Ford Museum) and village (Greenfield Village) would tell the story of American history more thoroughly and more accurately than any textbook or scholarship.” Ford and Mercer, like the progressive and “new” academic historians, viewed history as egalitarian and contextually relevant to the present. Mercer was heavily influenced by the work of social historian John Bach McMaster, who also worked at the University of Pennsylvania. Mercer believed “history should tell the stories of common people and that it should provide easily accessible insights into the present” and to “make historical objects significant to the present, to demonstrate a seamlessness between the past and the …show more content…
Several New Deal public policies were enacted to both put Americans back to work and to preserve its history and culture. They also brought many academic historians and recent graduates into the public sphere. Roosevelt placed the supervision of all federal historic sites under the National Park Service in 1933. These included the Historic American Building Survey, the Historical Records Survey, and the Historic Sites Act. The HRS enlisted historians to survey the holdings of state and local archives. This flurry of research activity catalyzed the campaign from J. Franklin Jameson and Waldo Leland for a National Archives. The HABS surveyed the country’s architectural heritage and served as boon for the historic preservation movement. The HSA prioritized sites of national importance and enlisted the expertise of historians. These programs and the university training was still rooted in scientific historical professionalism. The interpretations were conservative, as they left out a lot of the contextual issues of the site and did not challenge their visitors to connect the past to the present condition. Professionalism, unlike the personalistic preservation efforts at Mount Vernon, emphasizes the narrative history of the site rather than the sentimentalism and romanticism the preservationists attach to it. This methodology also
When Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president on 1932 he promised to use the power of government to help restore economic stability and to support the poor. Over the next several years, President Roosevelt's organization produced various new government efforts that would do just that, this was called The New Deal. The New Deal created programs like The Glass-Steagall Act, The Civilian Conservation Corps, The Works Progress Administration, and The Public Works Administration. The Glass-Steagall Act or the Banking Act separated commercial banking from investment banking to help protect deposits. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) employed young men on public-works projects. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) employed people to ...
The Tampa Museum of Art was not always the same museum that we see today. It went through multiple stages throughout the years. The works vary, creating a large spectrum from the old to the new. The social angles change with the exhibits in the museum, combining to create the diversity we see today. Visiting this museum in person helped me to appreciate it even more than I would have thought possible. Observing and analyzing the other visitors helped me to understand the museum’s impact on the community more than I would have been able to just by reading about it. This museum is much different from others than I have visited.
Hart, Diane, Bert Bower, and Jim Lobdell. History alive!:. Palo Alto, Calif.: Teachers' Curriculum Institute, 2002. Print.
examines monuments and memorials that deal with a variety of events in American History. He
During the New Deal period of 1933-1939 the national government took control of the United States’ economy. Our economy was failing and we needed a strong central government to take over in our time of need. Congress passed acts that created new federal agencies and programs proposed by the president in hopes of strengthening our economy. Some of the important programs were the Federal Housing Administration, the Civilian...
As I look at the painting of The Adoration of The Shepherds, two artists, Andrea Mantegna and El Greco, showed it different ways with same subjects. First, the title of the paintings is about Jesus's birth. Andrea mantegna artist had lived from ca 1430 to 1506. He established his reputation when he was 20 years old. This painting is the evident of his highly individual style. He worked it during ca 1451 to 1453. He painted it in horizontal format with 153/4x217/8(40x55.6). He used tempera on a canvas that transferred from a wood. In difference, El Greco(Spain 141-1641) worked it with oil color on canvas by vertical format. The size is 125 5/8x707/8(319x180cm). In Greco's painting, the objects are full on the canvas that big two angels and others are placed on top of the middle place, and the people are placed in triangle position based on the landscape. The landscape is very detail. The people I find it that Holy Maria is standing in the middle and the mountain is placed behind of Maria among the landscape things.
James B. Gardner, “Contested Terrain: History, Museums, and the Public,” The Public Historian 26.4 (Fall 2004), 11-21
Roosevelt, Roosevelt enacted the New Deal, a series of programs and initiatives that assisted many Americans in bringing stability back to the American economy and society. The First New Deal was launched in 1933. As many Americans lost their homes, jobs and life savings due to the Great Depression, the First New Deal focused on economic recovery (Foner, 815). President Roosevelt believed it was the government’s responsibility to guarantee every man the right to make a comfortable living (Foner, 810). Successively, he created many governmental jobs to assist the unemployed. In 1933, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was created (Foner, 805). This program set young men up to work on forest preservation projects, flood control, and improving national parks and wildlife (Foner, 805). This program helped over 3 million American men, by paying governmental wages to the workers (Foner, 805). Following the CCC, the Public Works Administration (PWA) was formed (Foner, 806). This program contracted with private construction agencies to build useful infrastructure around the United States, and was appropriated $3.3 billion to carryout the plan (Foner, 806). Trailing the PWA, the Civil Works Administration (CWA) was constructed. This program was much like the PWA, instead of contracting with private businesses, the CWA directly hired workers for construction projects (Foner, 806). These programs worked to get men back to
The Metropolitan Museum of Art came about as an idea from Jon Jay in Paris, France in 1866 with the idea of “national institution gallery of art” within the United States. Once this idea was proposed, it was immediately moved forward with his return to the United States. With the help of the Union League Club in NY they began to acquire civic leaders, businessmen, artists, and collectors who aided in the creation of the museum. For over 140 years, the visitors who go here have received everything the mission of the institution states.
In Stephen Weil’s essay, he argues “the museum’s role has transformed from one of mastery to one of service” (Weil, 196). According to him, museums have changed their mission from one that cultures the public to one that serves
The Museum Of Modern Art “MOMA” was firmly established on 53rd street in 1939 in Midtown Manhattan New York, after a decade of moving due to its growth in modern art pieces. Originally Patrons Miss Lillie P. Bliss, Mrs. Cornelius J. Sullivan, and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller Jr. wanted to establish a program dedicated to modern art in the late 1920s. A. Conger Goodyear, Paul Sachs, Frank Crowninshield and Josephine Boardman Crane, whom later became trustees, created the Museum Of Modern Art in 1929. It’s founding Director, Alfred H. Barr, Jr. wanted the MOMA to be "the greatest museum of modern art in the world." Its intent was to provide ordinary blue collar individuals with a better understanding and acknowledgment of art in its era.
New museology is the modernisation of museums. New museums are made to be more interactive and more interesting for the visitors. Displays in the museums are no longer covered in glass and people are encouraged to look more closely and interact with displays. The museums are brighter are the displays...
MacDonald, George F. “The Journal of Museum Education, Vol. 16, No. 1” Current Issues in Museum Learning (1991): 9-12. Web. 25 Feb. 2014.
have never been to a city that did not offer the usual museum fare, usually in the form of the “Anytown Art Museum”, or the “Anytown Museum of Natural History”. While these types of museums house some incredible artifacts, and I do visit them often, I also like to seek out museums of a more unusual sort.
A museum is “a building in which objects of historical, scientific, artistic, or cultural interest are stored and exhibited.” (dictionary.com). This is the literal definition of a museum as well as my view of them coming into my first semester of college. I believed they were boring, outdated places where historical items were displayed. As I moved through the semester, my professor helped me gain a new perspective of these remarkable museums; one of respect and astonishment. Museums are meant to aid in learning and safeguarding of things that should never be forgotten. Of the many great places I visited this semester that adjusted my feelings towards museums, the ones that had the greatest impact were The National Museum of Natural History, The Newseum, The National Gallery of Art, and The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. These places are there to remind the general public about things that should never be forgotten; they preserve the history and beauty of the world.