Smithsonian Institution

Because of budget cuts mandated by the federal sequestration, the Smithsonian Institution will begin closing galleries in some art museums to the public. Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough said Tuesday in a news release that the temporary closings would begin May 1 and would continue through Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year. He said that the closings are necessary because a hiring freeze has reduced the number of security guards available to patrol galleries. The Smithsonian is losing 5 percent of its federal budget from March through September, or about $41 million.

Because of budget cuts mandated by the federal sequestration, the Smithsonian Institution will begin closing galleries in some art museums to the public. Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough said Tuesday in a news release that the temporary closings would begin May 1 and would continue through Sept. 30, the end of the current fiscal year. He said that the closings are necessary because a hiring freeze has reduced the number of security guards available to patrol galleries. The Smithsonian is losing 5 percent of its federal budget from March through September, or about $41 million.

The Stranger and the Statesman: James Smithson, John Quincy Adams, and the Making of America's Greatest Museum: the Smithsonian, by Nina Burleigh. HarperCollins. 320 pages. $24.95. The Smithsonian Institution is vast. It consists of 16 museums, seven research centers, the National Zoo and, according to its Web site, collections of "objects, artworks and specimens" totaling more than 142 million items. There are also 129 affiliate museums that help allow the "the nation's attic" to display its holdings.

A geographical blessing we in Maryland share is our proximity to our nation's capital. Regardless of politics,Washington, D.C., is a majestic city whose stature in national and world history is on par with the likes of London, Rome, Tokyo, Madrid, Alexandria and Constantinople. A key reason for its standing, in addition to the moral and economic strength of the nation behind it, is that it serves as more than a political capital. It also is home to a repositories of publicly-accessible documents and artifacts that are arguably the greatest collection of human knowledge ever compiled.

WASHINGTON -- I voted for Howdy Doody.We were standing under the original Star-Spangled Banner -- the one that inspired Francis Scott Key to write the national anthem -- in the Smithsonian's Museum of American History, arguing (good-naturedly, for a change) over where to head first.Should we seek Oscar the Grouch or try out a high-wheel bicycle? Eat an old-fashioned sundae in the turn-of-the century Palm Court ice cream parlor or look for the huge steam locomotive engine? What about all the dinosaur bones next door?

WASHINGTON -- On a hazy August morning, an endless stream of tourists pours from the subway, fanning across the Mall to the museums that make up the Smithsonian Institution.Sporting sensible shoes, knapsacks, money belts and speaking a babble of languages, the tourists peer at a Diplodocus skeleton, Steinway's 100,000th grand piano, space suits of the first astronauts, the Greensboro, N.C., lunch counter where the first civil rights sit-in took place.It is more than a day trip or vacation for the 28 million people who tour the Smithsonian's 16 museums and National Zoo each year.

A 9-year-old Glen Burnie boy foiled an abduction attempt Tuesday when he pulled away from a woman who grabbed him while he was on a school field trip to the Natural History Museum of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, U.S. Park Police said.It was the first time in memory that someone has attempted an abduction in the museum, according to Maj. James McLaughlin, a Park Police spokesman. McLaughlin said he does not believe the incident is related to two other recent abduction attempts in the Washington area.

WASHINGTON - About 1639 the Mogul Emperor Shah Jahan of India, builder of the Taj Mahal, commissioned a great book to record the splendor of his reign. Meant to be illustrated with miniature paintings by the finest artists of the imperial atelier, it was titled, immodestly, the "Padshahnama," or "Chronicle of the King of the World."Shah Jahan was deposed by one of his sons in 1658. Only part of his book, it seems, was ever completed. After his death, 44 paintings executed for various court projects were cobbled together and bound with a written account of the first 10 years of his reign.

WASHINGTON -- America's "first lady," who lived at England's first permanent settlement in North America nearly four centuries ago, is spending the holidays at the Smithsonian Institution, where scientists are carefully examining her bones for traces of disease.She was given the title "first lady" by the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities, which owns the Jamestown., Va., site and recently announced that it had identified her remains as those of a "Mistress Forrest," wife of "Thomas Forrest, Gentleman," one of the first colonists to come to what is now the United States.

The former director of the National Air & Space Museum seems at peace with the memory of his own head on a platter. Martin Harwit served it at his boss' request, resigning after a long dispute over a planned exhibit about the atomic bombings of Japan.Some of his adversaries publicly applauded his downfall, others were content to claim a customary spoil of victory: the power to have history told their way.Harwit, an astrophysicist by profession, went home to Washington, disappointed but not bitter.

A year after a financial scandal forced the head of the Smithsonian Institution to resign, the organization announced yesterday that it had named a highly regarded university president, G. Wayne Clough of the Georgia Institute of Technology, as its new chief. Clough, 66, a civil engineer by training, was selected Friday night as the new secretary, or chief executive, in a unanimous vote of the Smithsonian's board of regents, officials said at a news conference in Washington. He will assume the post July 1. He faces the task of restoring stability to an institution that is struggling with a $2.5 billion shortfall, crumbling buildings and the repercussions of last year's scandal.

Does it seem as though your lilacs are opening earlier than they did in your childhood? Have you noticed the dogwood, wild columbine and Virginia bluebells blooming earlier? It's not your imagination. Though there are certainly seasonal fluctuations from year to year, as the recent cool spell can attest, studies are showing global warming is having an effect on our gardens. "Many plants are blooming weeks earlier than they used to," says David Inouye, professor of biology at the University of Maryland, College Park.

Freer at 100 It was the first of the Smithsonian Institution's art galleries. And this year it's celebrating its centennial. The Freer Gallery of Art presents a daylong celebration Saturday. The museum was founded in 1906 by Detroit railroad-car manufacturer Charles Lang Freer, who donated his Asian art collection to the Smithsonian Institution's regents and donated money for the building in which to house the art. Today, the museum still houses an extensive collection of east Asian art. All day Saturday, visitors to the museum can take part in an Asian-themed 100th birthday celebration.

Dr. Audrey Blyman Davis, a retired Smithsonian Institution curator who created exhibits at the National Museum of Dentistry in Baltimore, died of leukemia Tuesday at her Bolton Hill home. She was 72. Audrey Helen Blyman was born in Hicksville, N.Y., and attended public and Catholic schools on Long Island. In 1956, she earned her bachelor's degree in chemistry and education from what was then Adelphi College in Garden City, N.Y. After three years teaching high school, she received a fellowship to study at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for a year.

CLOSE YOUR EYES and conjure up what comes to mind when you hear the words "American Indian." No matter your political correctness, the dominant image is probably one of feathers and war paint, bows and arrows, buffalo and teepees, beads and skins, wisdom and warfare. It is an image derived from adventure movies and childhood books, from sepia-tinged photographs and museum exhibitions, from exploitative television shows and earnest documentaries. Even recent publicity about Indian casinos cannot blemish its iconic power.

Rafael Cordero Santiago, 61, mayor of the Puerto Rican city of Ponce, died yesterday morning after suffering a brain hemorrhage, officials said. Mr. Cordero fell ill late Friday and was admitted to the Medical Center of Rio Piedras in the capital, San Juan, where he slipped into a coma and died, Health Secretary Johnny Rullan said. Mr. Cordero had been involved in Puerto Rican politics since 1969. Rose Cree, 82, an American Indian artist recognized as one of the most talented modern weavers of traditional red willow baskets, has died in Dunseith, N.D. Ms. Cree died Tuesday, family members said.

John C. Ewers,87, an expert on the culture of American Indians and a retired senior ethnologist at the Smithsonian Institution, died May 7 in Arlington, Va. He established the Museum of the Plains Indian at Browning, Mont., and was its first curator from 1941 to 1944.Pub Date: 5/19/97

Faith has long been a part of the story told and retold by African-American artists. The significance of spirituality and religion in black American life is the subject of a fascinating exhibit at the Anacostia Museum of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington."

The Stranger and the Statesman: James Smithson, John Quincy Adams, and the Making of America's Greatest Museum: the Smithsonian, by Nina Burleigh. HarperCollins. 320 pages. $24.95. The Smithsonian Institution is vast. It consists of 16 museums, seven research centers, the National Zoo and, according to its Web site, collections of "objects, artworks and specimens" totaling more than 142 million items. There are also 129 affiliate museums that help allow the "the nation's attic" to display its holdings.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - In her house at 103 Irving St., Julia Child is sitting at the big Norwegian pine table, reminiscing about the room that has become one of America's best-known kitchens. "It's the beating heart of the home," she says, sipping a cup of coffee and nibbling on a well-buttered pastry. At 89, Child is moving to a retirement community in Southern California. But the famous kitchen will be stripped to the bare plaster, carefully labeled and packed, and shipped to its new home at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History on the Mall in Washington.