America’s Shopping Mall

Imagine my surprise—upon my first visit to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History (NMAH) since it reopened last December after being closed for two years for an $85 million remodeling—when I discovered that the NMAH has been replaced by a shopping mall! The building is still there, to be sure, but inside mighty forces have been at work. I suppose my first clue should have been the name change. The old name is still carved in the stone over the entrance (I guess it was too expensive to replace it all) but a new name has been added underneath: the NMAH has been renamed the Kenneth E. Behring Center. On the exterior, the two names share billing, but once inside the old NMAH moniker disappears and the ubiquitous Kenneth E. Behring name is everywhere.

Entering the Behring Center from the Constitution Avenue entrance one is immediately struck by the essence of the remodel. The first floor has done away with most of those bothersome historical exhibits. It is now a wide, open, airy and light-filled concourse, resembling nothing so much as the main promenade of the typical American shopping mall. The space is designed to sweep the visitor straight from the entrance to the Gift Shop at the far end. (Entering from the Mall entrance, a similar effect has been achieved, as one comes first to the Gift Shop on that floor.)

Of course, if one is slow to get the significance of architectural design, one can pause briefly at the Café immediately on right of the Constitution Avenue entrance, where those little round peppermint candies that restaurants hand out free after a meal go for 15 cents a piece.

In the rush to move the visitor from the entrance to the Gift Shop, the museum staff has thoughtfully lined the walls with glass display cases holding a few sample artifacts from various of the museum’s collections. It seems to be a kind of archetypal approach to museum design: why bother with all those dusty old objects, surely a few representative artifacts will do. Besides, we don’t want the visitor to linger too long over the artifacts; where would be the profit in that?"

One’s next clue that something rather radical has changed is the Information counter a few paces from the entrance. It has a tag-team of attendants, one to hand out the brochures—to maintain the cover-story that this is an information booth—and the other to operate the cash register. Why, one wonders, do they need a cash register at the Information booth? Does the Smithsonian now charge for information? And then they hit you with their sales-pitch. The main function of the Information booth on the first floor seems to be to sell tickets to the carnival rides in the basement. They sell those tickets like eager real estate agents in a recession. Or like carnival shills.

I am not making this up. On the ground floor of the Behring Center—where the old gift shop used to be—there are now half a dozen rides, like at the carnival. There are ticket booths here as well (in case you evaded the Information booth), and lines of eager children who have finally found something of interest in all this stuff about history. The brochure for the rides celebrates: “America’s Love for Adventure, Speed & Thrills.” “Choose your adventure and take an exciting virtual trip on one of our futuristic ride simulators.” (Tickets are $7 per person; Visa and MasterCard accepted; “Ask about Combo Specials. Discounts available for groups of 10 or more.”) Avid seekers of history, may choose from among: the Cosmic Race in 3D; the Bermuda Triangle Adventure 3D; the Solar Coaster 3D; the Grand Prix Raceway (“Experience a heated Formula 1 race with heart-stopping crossover sections and high-stress turns as your engine revs at maximum RPMs to carry you to victory.”); the Astro Canyon ride (“Take a wild journey on a radical roller coaster . . .”); and the Glacier Run downhill race. You know, just the standard categories of American history. Just like at Disneyland!

Money Makes the World go ‘Round

Well now, $85 million dollars is a lot of money, even in Washington, and it has to come from somewhere. I suppose it would be anachronistic to even wonder whether a public undertaking like the nation’s national museum of American history ought not to be funded by the citizens of the Republic, in the form of that unspeakable horror: taxes.  Apparently, it is much easier to find vain people with more money than taste, who want to splash their names all over public buildings. Kenneth E. Behring—whose career as a real-estate tycoon, former owner of the Seattle Seahawks football team and big-game hunter—apparently qualifies him to dictate museum content and display philosophy. Well, that and the $80 million he pledged for the redesign.

Behring’s gift came with lots of strings, some obvious (his name being everywhere for instance), some not so obvious. For example, as a condition of tossing his money bags in the Smithsonian’s direction, Behring demanded oversight of the redesign and input into the exhibits. He insisted his personal architect be hired for the initial redesign work; and he earmarked portions of his contribution to specific projects in which he had a special interest, such as a vastly expanded exhibit devoted to celebrating the American military.

To be fair, in 1988 Behring opened his own museum—the Blackhawk Automotive Museum—to house his personal collection of vintage automobiles, which he “donated” to the museum, and for which donation he promptly took a tax write-off. So we could say he has some museum experience.

In 1996, the New York Times reported Behring settled (for an undisclosed sum) a sexual harassment suit filed by his former secretary who alleged that not only did he sexually harass her, but he forced her to fill his Viagra prescriptions, and she had to keep on hand multiple copies of Behring’s standard form letter which he required all his sexual conquests to sign as a kind of “pre-nup,” forgoing any right to sue him for money after they had sex. A real prince of a fellow, whose name now graces America’s national museum of our history.

A visitor will also discover many other notables with money have purchased pieces of our national heritage: there is the Jerome and Dorothy Lemelson Hall of Invention; the General Motors Hall of Transportation; the Kenneth E. Behring Hall of Military History; the Dibner Library of the History of Science and Technology; the Leonard Carmichael Auditorium; and the Samuel J. and Ethel Lafrak Lobby, among others.  

The renovations to the museum will not be complete until 2014—so there is more to look forward to. No doubt, along these same lines. The Smithsonian has already announced another large bequest from student-loan mogul Catherine B. Reynolds, who has promised the museum $38 million, to build a 10,000 square foot hall to honor “America’s Achievers.” Ms. Reynolds, whose strings require, inter alia, that she gets to appoint 10 of the 15 members of the oversight board who will create the new hall, has made it clear who she thinks belongs in the pantheon of achievers. She has specifically listed Martha Stewart and the founder of Federal Express, Fredrick Smith. And, one presumes, her good self as well.

Now that pieces of America’s national history museum are available to the highest bidder, I have begun to see a certain utility in the practice. I have my eye on one of the benches outside the first floor restrooms. I mean, how much could it really cost me to have my name engraved on that bench? Or maybe they could sell the naming rights to the toilet stalls themselves. I know one former U.S. Senator who has been lending his name to toilet stalls for free—a missed revenue opportunity if ever there was one.

Next the corporate sponsors will probably turn their lusts on The Castle. After all, it hasn’t be remodeled since its creation in 1855. It still looks so very “old-Europe.” I envision flashing neon signs above the entrance. One waits with breathless anticipation to see what corporation wants to carve its name on James Smithson’s coffin.

I am not so naïve as to think that private donations have no place in a successful museum. But may I suggest that what honorable corporate and other private sponsorship would look like would be a dignified mention in the museum’s brochure. Or better yet, how about the old-fashioned tradition of the anonymous gift? Why does the pursuit of private support for public ventures require this garish splashing about of the names of people with money?

A Postmodern Sensibility

Not everything which has been changed has changed for the worse. The Star-Spangled Banner has been moved to a darkened display case behind the wall facing the Mall entrance. So it is better protected and preserved. An old-fashioned museum function perhaps, but welcome nonetheless.

Although, honestly, I don’t see the need for the abstract metallic flag fronting for the Star-Spangled Banner—hanging where the flag itself used to hang. This objet d'art is composed of 960 mirrored pieces of metal, forming a “stunning installation,” we are to believe. Oh well, what’s the harm?

In general, what has been done in the name of a new design philosophy is to minimize the emphasis on the physical objects in the various collections, and cocoon them in new layers of social history context.

So now the stools from the Greensboro Lunch Counter sit-in of 1960 have been taken out of their display case and plopped in an open space on the floor, next to a bank of escalators. This is now the site for “living history” performances in which a young black woman invites members of the audience to come forward to pretend they are sitting in at the Greensboro Lunch Counter. She encourages the audience, in full fiery 1960s rhetoric, to rise up against the oppressors of black people. “Who will rise up? Who will come forward?” she demands. I wouldn’t say she whips the audience into a frenzy; but it felt more like a pulpit-call at Sunday services than a visit to a museum—at least as I am used to that notion.

Whole huge exhibits have disappeared. The first floor used to house an exhibit entitled “Information Age: People, Information and Technology.” This was a 14,000 square foot display with over 900 original artifacts: Samuel Morse’s telegraphs, Alexander Bell's telephones, a Hollerith punched card machine, a German ENIGMA encoder, the ENIAC computer, the TELESTAR test satellite, and a selection of early personal computers, among many other artifacts. This has all been crated-up and stored away in a warehouse somewhere and replaced by “Julia Child’s Kitchen.”

Some of this is fine. Some of it is a bit excessive. Most of the exhibits are now populated by a somewhat disconcerting race of gray, plaster-like, life-size human figures—who wear the clothes, board the buses and hold the various objects on display. The purpose of these gray people is to illustrate in a three-dimensional way that the objects in the museum are, after all, by for and about human beings.

Along with populating the exhibits with the mute gray people, the exhibits themselves have almost all be redesigned around the mannequins. Now, in many instances, the mannequin figures are the foreground and the historical objects the backdrop. This has the effect of minimizing many of the objects on display. For example, one of the most powerful objects in the NMAH collections is the huge green and black Southern Railways steam locomotive. A visitor to the “America on the Move” exhibit used to come into the back hall of this exhibit and be struck with the presence of this massive locomotive, which was on the same level as the visitor, and completely open and approachable. It was stunning. It was exciting. Almost everyone would stand next to the gigantic wheels of the engine and have their pictures taken. This exhibit has been reworked to add a wooden passenger platform, at a higher level than the train, which (with its gray people) emphasizes the passengers riding on trains like the Southern. The train itself has now been partially covered up by this new platform—dramatically reducing its visual presence. Now, visitors walk onto the wooden platform, read the label, and move on—unmoved. The train used to overawe, now it is diminished. Being occasionally over-awed in a museum is still, I think, a desirable thing.

There is also evidence of a peculiar sensibility about just what counts as historical and what is merely pandering to the tastes of the moment. For example, many of the traditional “cultural” objects (Archie Bunker’s chair; Dorothy’s ruby-slippers) have been consigned to a small room on the third floor. On the wall outside the room with these older cultural objects one will find a portrait of Steven Colbert and a celebration of the Colbert Report, which is, by the way, prominently featured in the museum brochure, while Archie and Dorothy are not to be found in its pages. I guess popular culture passes into venerated history at a much more rapid pace these days.

There are also some more traditional sorts of “contested history” sensibilities on display throughout the updated museum.

On the first floor, as the most prominent object down the west wing, one espies a large wooden telescope from the 19th century. One wonders what major astronomical discovery was made through its lenses. It turns out, this particular telescope is on display because it was the one used by America’s first female astronomer. Oh well, it is still an impressive object.

One concession to our multicultural sensibilities I did find a trifle odd. There is one room on the second floor dedicated to African-American history, which is well and good. Despite being no larger than any of the other exhibits, and considerably smaller than most, this room was somewhat grandiloquently designated as the “National Museum of African American History and Culture Gallery.” I confess I do not understand the need for a National Museum inside the National Museum.

Out with the Old

The new blockbuster movie “Night at the Museum, Battle of the Smithsonian” takes place in the NMAH, the Air and Space Museum and the Smithsonian Castle, as well as in a mythical “federal archives” underneath the Smithsonian. The NMAH has partnered with the film’s producers to help market the film, like McDonald’s does with its movie-themed promotions. The NMAH has developed a 12-page full-color brochure about the film (well, okay, 11 pages tout the film, the 12th page is a McDonald’s ad). The brochure even features a game for the kiddies to play: find the objects in the NMAH that are used as props in the film. The perfect marriage of commerce-seeking and public service.

In any case, the movie opens with a scene in New York City’s Museum of Natural History where all the old exhibits (Teddy Roosevelt on his horse, life-size figures of primitive man, etc.) are being retired in favor of an electronic virtual exhibit. All the physical objects of our natural history are being replaced by their electronic analogs. This is the premise of the movie. Because the artifacts are being crated-up and shipped to the “federal archives,” the action in the movie shifts from the NYC of the first film to Washington, D.C. for this sequel. So the film’s basic premise is that actual artifacts are no longer of any interest or value, and their imaginary counterparts are preferable. In a strange way, the redesign of the NMAH is life imitating art in that there are noticeably fewer artifacts on display in the redesigned space. The physical objects have not all been replaced by virtual ones necessarily; but their presence, their impact, their heft, has been diminished.  

Perhaps the worst aspect of the re-design is that it conveys the impression that the curators are embarrassed by the fact that the place is a museum. “Museums” conjure up images of stuffy, old-fashioned, daresay even old, places. This old model of the museum is so very passé, don’t you know. And certainly not the kind of “destination site” craved by your modern, free-spending tourist. Indeed, the curators point with pride to the fact that they have escaped that dusty old designation as “America’s attic.” Now it is more like a theme-park, with the theme still being, alas, that unfortunate stuff about the past—but one can only do so much with what one has to work with.

For example, one hugely popular and impressive exhibit in the “old” museum was the Foucault Pendulum (which was removed prior to the current renovations). The Foucault Pendulum consisted of a 52-foot cable suspended from the ceiling down through a round opening in the second floor, with a 240 lb. brass globe at the end. A row of candles was set up on the first floor, and the motion of the pendulum over the course of the day, as it knocked down the candles one-by-one, demonstrated the earth’s motion. This was a very physical—one is tempted to say, 19th century—way to communicate something fundamental about the physics of our planet. Now this sort of information is conveyed only on touch-screen video monitors. It seems to me that some important aspect of the physicality of the physics is thereby lost. One can almost grasp the idea of the earth’s motion when contemplating Foucault’s Pendulum, because of its very physical size and heft and obvious motion in the world. Somehow, an electronic illustration does not convey the same gut-level understanding.

In general, what has happened in the redesign is that the hard, physical, objects, have been deemphasized, and “softer” more sociological, aspects of the past have risen in importance. Some of this is probably laudable; and it is the trend of our times in any event. But I can’t escape the sensation that the Smithsonian’s American history experience has been subtly altered in the process.

The Purpose of a Museum

What, we finally have to ask, is the purpose of a history museum after all? Old fossil specimen that I am, I would have been tempted to answer: “to educate the public about the past.” It seems that for the current curators of America’s museum, the answer is: “to entertain.” These two goals do not always amount to the same thing.

To learn about the past just might require some slow and thoughtful engagement with the artifacts in a museum. I won’t go so far as to say that hushed reverence ought to be the prevailing mood in a museum; but I will confess that I believe the experience ought to be noticeably closer to that end of the continuum of excitements.

I freely admit that in watching the hordes of joyfully-sprung students on their field trips to the NMAH (oops, sorry, I mean the Behring Center) it is clear they are enjoying themselves—in a Disneyland sort of way. There is much yelping and yapping and running about. There is a lot of “high-fiving” and mugging for photographs. There is the incredible din of the place, which makes conversation, not to mention thought, next to impossible. Cueing up in the cafeteria food lines, and finding a place to sit, is reminiscent of a rugby scrum—and this mood carries on throughout most of the exhibit spaces. Not to belabor the metaphor, but trying to view many of the exhibits in the museum reminds me of the jostling that goes on in trying to get to the best rides at Disneyland.

Coda

Walking through the NMAH is like nothing so much as strolling the aisles of a bustling American shopping mall. I must admit, most of the customers seem pleased with the products on display.

The thought that it might be our responsibility—as curators of the nation’s history—not merely to cater to our customers’ commonplace desires, but instead, to call them to a more refined sensibility when approaching the artifacts of the past, betrays me as perhaps a museum piece myself. I probably should be on display in some dusty exhibit, in some remote, un-redesigned, corner of the museum. But please, don’t let Kenneth E. Behring put his name on me.