Museum of African American History and Culture Preview
I was sorta lucky last Sunday. The Smithsonian offered employees and volunteers (I've volunteered at the Folklife festival for half a dozen years and started volunteering at the Zoo at the Amazonia exhibit in August) the chance to see the new Museum of African American History and Culture before the big opening this weekend. Evidently the free timed-entry passes to the museum have "sold out" on weekends through Christmas, though weekday passes are available in November, so Robin and I were psyched to see it. I still remember how exciting it was to wander the new Museum of the Native American Indian at 2 AM the night it opened when, for the only day ever, the majority of the visitors were native americans. I thought the optics might not be great, to see a bunch of white folks entering the museum before everyone else (most Smithsonian employees and volunteers are lily white like me). But once we got there the crowd was somewhat...