Capital Assets
By Laura Koss-Feder
Washington is a city of famous museums--the Smithsonian, the National Archives, even the White House. But could those attractions be too famous? Visitors who are drawn to them almost automatically may not realize that the nation's capital boasts a second tier of smaller, more specialized museums that are equally fascinating and often possess certain distinct advantages over their bigger, better-known brethren. For starters, they are less crowded and often inexpensive or free. In those institutions, adventurous tourists can find colorful, offbeat exhibits highlighting world-class collections, in some cases the only ones of their kind.
Consider the example of Mimi Donaldson, 57, a Los Angeles motivational speaker and author. Donaldson regards herself as something of an aficionado of museums--having been to 50 of them around the world. But when, on a recent business trip, she toured Washington's International Spy Museum, she found the experience unlike any she had ever had. The five-year-old facility is the only one in the world dedicated entirely to espionage and features artifacts, interactive displays, films, video and historic photos. Exhibits show how to create and hide coded messages, tell the story of celebrity spies such as Julia Child and Marlene Dietrich, and offer a glimpse of espionage in biblical times.
Donaldson saw items ranging from a 1777 letter by George Washington authorizing a network of spies in New York City to a latter-day camera so tiny that it is concealed in a button. "I grew up in the cold war, where we sat under our desks in school during drills and hoped that we wouldn't be bombed," Donaldson says. "The Spy Museum brought that time in my life back to me in full, living color."
Like many of Washington's specialty institutions, the Spy Museum seems to have a particular appeal for baby boomers, perhaps because they have the historical perspective with which to appreciate the subject. According to Peter Earnest, founding executive director, 75% of the museum's visitors are 50 and older. Boomers like Donaldson can live out their Mission: Impossible fantasies by selecting an undercover persona--complete with false name, age and other traits--upon entering the museum. Before they exit, an interactive display tests them on how well they remember the details of their new identity.
Those whose taste for high tech has been whetted by the spyware can move on to the Marian Koshland Science Museum. The institution, part of the National Academy of Sciences, explains "the science behind the headlines" in layman's terms and focuses on cutting-edge research and how it impacts people's lives, says director Patrice Legro. There are exhibits on global warming, forensics and DNA replication, and even an interactive display called "Lights at Night" that allows visitors to navigate the globe using a joystick, along the way viewing data on energy use and population changes around the planet.
Julia Bland, 54, a children's museum director from New Orleans, found the Koshland to be a standout among science-oriented museums. "This place is much more interpretive--not just showing cause and effect--and encourages people to think for themselves, which is something that we baby boomers are certainly known for," says Bland. She first visited on a business trip, then returned on a family vacation. She likes that the Koshland "doesn't preach to the public." Right, says Legro. The museum, a little more than a year old, strives to be thought provoking but pursues no political agenda.
Want to feel the inside of a stomach? View a smoker's lung? The National Museum of Health and Medicine enables tourists to see and feel the effects of disease on the human body and documents the shifting course of the history of medicine, says Jeffrey Reznick, senior curator. Founded in 1862, the institution is at its ninth location, on the campus of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The setting is appropriate, since the museum traces changes in the practice of medicine during various wars. Its collection of artifacts includes the bullet that killed Abraham Lincoln and Paul Revere's dental equipment (bet you didn't know that in addition to being a silversmith, Revere was a dentist).
For those who lean more toward literature than science and medicine, the 73-year-old Folger Shakespeare Library has the world's largest collection of the Bard's memorabilia and printed works--even outnumbering collections in his native England, says director Gail Kern Paster. The first folio from 1623 is one of the Folger's most prized Shakespeare rarities. There are also non-Shakespeare engravings, artifacts and writings from 1500 to 1800. Special exhibits have included letter writing--which featured correspondence among sweethearts and an unopened letter written by King George I--from the same time frame. The library houses a 240-seat theater that features professional performances of Shakespeare's works (starting Oct. 23: Much Ado About Nothing), as well as other shows, concerts and readings throughout the year. "We really appeal to the reading population of the boomer generation," Paster says.
Also celebrating the arts--but from a female perspective--is the district's National Museum of Women in the Arts. The 24-year-old establishment shows work by more than 800 women artists, from Renaissance paintings to contemporary sculpture. Unlike most facilities that showcase women's art, this one doesn't dwell on a single period or collections from one artist, notes director Judy Larson. Nor does it focus solely on painting and sculpture. Special exhibits have also concentrated on women in film, literature and music. "Baby-boomer women who were coming of age in the late 1960s and early 1970s and see themselves as pioneers will be able to relate to the works of our artists, who were also pioneers for their various times in history," says Larson.
Tourists willing to venture a few miles out of the district to Fairfax, Va., will be rewarded by another of the area's unusual institutions, the 68-year-old National Firearms Museum. Run by the National Rifle Association, it has one of the country's largest collections of rare and historical guns. More than 2,000 are on display, including those that belonged to Napoleon (an 1800 double flintlock fowler shotgun), Annie Oakley, Theodore Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower, says senior curator Doug Wicklund.
On view through the end of 2006 is a special exhibit called the "Arsenal of Democracy," which honors World War II veterans with a display of firearms used in battle. Wicklund points out that about half of the museum's visitors are at least 50 years old and carry vivid memories of some of the country's most significant recent wars. "Like so many other museums in the Washington area," Wicklund sums up, "we're a hidden treasure waiting to be discovered."
WHERE TO FIND THEM
o International Spy Museum
800 F Street N.W.
202-393-7798
www.spymuseum.org
Adults: $14; seniors (65 or older): $13; children 5 to 11: $11; children under 5: no charge
Open 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. April through October; 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. November through March
o Marian Koshland Science Museum
6th and E streets N.W.
202-334-1201
www.koshland-science-museum.org
Adults: $5; seniors (65 or older) and students 5 to 18: $3
Open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. every day except Tuesday
o National Museum of Health and Medicine
6900 Georgia Avenue (at Elder Street N.W.)
202-782-2200
www.nmhm.washingtondc .museum
Free admission
Open 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
o Folger Shakespeare Library
201 East Capitol Street S.E.
202-544-4600
www.folger.edu
Free admission
Open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. every day except Sunday
o National Museum of Women in the Arts
1250 New York Avenue N.W.
202-783-5000
www.nmwa.org
Adults: $8; seniors (60 or older) and students over 18: $5
Open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday
o National Firearms Museum
11250 Waples Mill Road Fairfax, Va.
703-267-1600
www.nra.nationalfirearms.museum
Free admission
Open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
o Websites for Washington tourist and museum information
www.washington.org
www.culturaltourismdc.org