Since its start in 2003, the museum has built a collection of almost 30,000 objects covering major periods of African American history, beginning with the origins in Africa and continuing through slavery, the civil rights era, the Harlem Renaissance, the great migrations north and west and into the 21st century.
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Museum officials said the new Smithsonian facility will chronicle the complex relationship between the USA and a people it once enslaved, and tell the story of those who worked to make the necessary changes to bring the country to where it is today. “We were scared that it wouldn’t open during (Obama’s) presidency because a typical Smithsonian project takes about 10 to 12 years to build”.
The president and Mrs. Obama are hosting a White House reception later Friday to celebrate the museum.
He and his wife, Michelle, will join others on the National Mall for Saturday’s ribbon cutting. People are flying in from around the country to be some of the first inside, if they were lucky enough to get the coveted opening-day tickets.
In Connecticut, museum-goers have their choice of 19 participating institutions that run the gamut from fine art, history, and natural history, to more specialized museums like the New England Carousel Museum in Bristol, and Tolland’s Old Tolland County Jail and Museum. Congressman John Lewis of Georgia, a longtime civil rights icon, worked with then-Sen. Former President George W. Bush signed legislation authorizing the museum in 2003, and construction started in 2012.
From the unique architecture recalling the crown of an African princess to the 400,000 square feet of history inside, this is truly a place for all people.
“We felt it was crucial to craft a museum that would help America remember and confront, confront its tortured racial past”, said Lonnie Bunch, the director of the museum, at a press conference marking the museum’s opening.
Inside, museum officials say they have almost 3,000 items occupying 85,000 square feet of exhibition space including exhibits like a Tuskegee Airmen training plane and the casket of Emmitt Till, a murdered African-American boy whose death helped rally the civil rights movement. “Because in so many ways, it is the best of times”.
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Among the thousands of exhibits in the museum are artifacts from both Carolinas including: A red flag that announced slave market day in Charleston, on loan from the South Carolina Historical Society; Student desks from the black Hope Rosenwald School in Pomaria, S.C.; and a rusted branding iron bearing an artistic symbol from West Africa, found in Walterboro, S.C. But some of the biggest donors’ names adorn the walls inside, including the Oprah Winfrey Theater; the Michael Jordan Hall: Game Changers; and the newest named addition, Robert F. Smith Explore Your Family History Center.
