Chronology 



157 



April 28 



■ Exhibition "Rock 'n' Soul: Social Crossroads," a collabora- 

 rion berween rhe National Museum of American History 

 and Memphis Rock 'n' Soul, Inc., is located in the Gibson 

 Guitar factory in Memphis, Tennessee. It examines the rich 

 musical heritage of the Memphis area. "Rock 'n' Soul" fo- 

 cuses on this transformation-migration, urbanization, racial 

 and class issues, civil rights, and youth culture — through the 

 medium of music. 



April 29 



■ Exhibition "Looping the Loop: Posters of Early Flight" 

 began a national tour at the Smithsonian's National Air 

 and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. With more than 

 30 vintage oversized postets, the exhibition, organized 

 by SITES, chronicles modern aviation from its earliest 

 inception of balloons and dirigibles (airships) to mono- and 

 biplanes. 



April 29 



■ Public program A Grain of Sand Reunion Concett: Singers 

 Nobuko Miyamoto, Chris Iijima, and Charlie Chin recorded 

 the seminal Asian American album A Grain of Sand: Songs 

 from the Birth of Asian America in 1973. Their music played 

 an integral role in the burgeoning Asian American move- 

 ment. Miyamoto, Iijima, and Chin petformed original songs 

 from the 1970s that are as meaningful now as they were 

 then. Organized by the Program for Asian Pacific American 

 Studies Program, cosponsored by Tsunami Theater, and 

 funded by rhe Washington Post. Additional support provided 

 by Sarurn Elecrronics & Engineering, Inc. 



April 30 



■ Exhibition "Music in the Age of Confucius" opened at the 

 Arrhur M. Sackler Gallery. The exhibition presented a set of 

 36 tare bells, chime stones, zithers, flutes, drums, and pan- 

 pipes representing the largest and best-preserved cache of 

 ancient musical instruments ever discovered. Most of the 

 objects in the show were on loan from the Hubei Provincial 

 Museum in central China and were on view for the first time 

 in the United States. The exhibition offered several public 

 programs and an audio rour narrated by renowned cellist 

 Yo-Yo Ma. 



April 30 



■ Exhibition "Btushing the Past: Later Chinese Calligraphy 

 from the Gift of Robett Hatfield Ellsworth," a presentation 

 of 20 examples from Ellsworth's recent gift of works daring 

 from the eighteenth to twentieth centuries opened at the 

 Freer Gallery of Art. The pieces on view were just a sample 

 of the 260 works donated by Ellsworth in honor of the 

 Freer's 75 th anniversary in 1998. 



June 



■ Donation The Smithsonian Women's Committee made an 

 endowment gift of $100,000 to the Smithsonian American 

 Art Museum to establish lectutes at the Renwick Gallery on 

 American craft as a mulridisciplinary program, featuring 

 practicing craft arrisrs, curarors, arr hisrorians, and anthro- 

 pologisrs with the purpose of increasing contemporary craft 

 art scholarship. 



April 29 



■ Public program The Smirhsonian Associates' weekend 

 seminar, "Rickover, Submarines, and the Cold War," com- 

 plemented the exhibition "Fast Attacks and Boomers: 

 Submarines in the Cold War" at the National Museum of 

 Ametican Hisrory. 



April 29-August 1 3 



■ Exhibition Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga, a special 

 exhibition developed by the Arctic Studies Center at the 

 National Museum of Natural Hisrory, followed the Vikings' 

 expansion from Scandanavia across rhe Norrh Atlantic to 

 North America. The exhibition commemorared the millen- 

 nial anniversary of Leif Erikson's arrival in the New World, 

 500 years before Columbus. It showcased spectacular arti- 

 facts and discussed new findings that shed light on the 

 Viking seamanship and the disappearance of the Norse 

 colonies in Greenland. Royalty and heads of states from all 

 of the Scandinavian nations attended the exhibition's gala 

 opening. In addition, the Web site accompanying the exhi- 

 bition won sevetal awards. 



June 



■ Grant Dr. Sorena Sorenson of the National Museum of 

 Natural History's Department of Mineral Sciences received 

 an $88,500 grant from the Department of Energy. Entitled 

 "Low-T, Fluid-Ashflow Tuff Intetactions: How Rock 

 Textures, Chemisrry, and Mineralogy Reflect Reaction Path- 

 ways, and Influence Rock Response to Heating," the grant 

 will support a postdoctoral fellow ro do research on altered 

 volcanic rocks from Creede, Colorado; Socorro, New Mexico; 

 several localities in eastern California; and one sire in south- 

 ern Arizona. Observations made in the Deparrmenr's digital 

 cathodoluminescense laboratory (which was upgraded 

 through a major equipment grant a few years ago) will be a 

 key component in this research. The grant will run for rwo 

 years. 



June 



■ Award Maryland Governor Parris Glendening visited 

 SERC to present an award from the Maryland Rural Legacy 

 Program to help conserve lands of the Rhode River warer- 

 shed and adjoining areas in agricultutal land-use. 



