What Historians Don't Talk About

Object Details

Creator: Anacostia Neighborhood Museum
Names: Anacostia Community Museum; Anacostia Neighborhood Museum; Boorstin, Daniel J. (Daniel Joseph), 1914-2004
Collection Creator: Anacostia Community Museum

Topic: African Americans; Museums; Museum techniques; Historians; Research; Oral history

Custodial History: Created for Anacostia Neighborhood Museum. Recorded at a board banquet at Smithsonian Commons.

Collection Citation: Anacostia Community Museum Programs and Projects, 1967-1989, Anacostia Community Museum Archives, Smithsonian Institution.

Scope and Contents: At a board banquet, Dr. Boorstin, Director of National Museum of History and Technology, speaks of the problems of the historian and the museum director. Specifically, he talks about the challenges of research, interpreting objects, materials which are surrounded by controversy, researching the ephemeral such as oral tradition, and writing about subjects which have not been well chronciled such as what people ate, the American family, and the failures which lead to a successful invention. Boorstin titled his remarks "What Historians Don't Talk About." Question and answer session follows speech.; Speech. Part of ACM Museum Events, PR, and Ceremonies Recordings.Dated 19730614.

Collection Restrictions: Use of the materials requires an appointment. Some items are not accessible due to obsolete format and playback machinery restrictions. Please contact the archivist at acmarchives@si.edu.