National Museum of American History, Part 3

I return once again to the National Museum of American History, which I visited back in July during my adventure in Washington, DC. This is part three of a four part series. The first part covered the second floor of the museum plus “Entertainment Nation”. The second part covered “First Ladies”, “American Presidency”, and “The Price of Freedom”. This third part will cover “Food” and “American on the Move”, both located on the first floor.

Looking up at the stained glass ceiling in a long, narrow room with rounded ends. The small pieces of glass are white, yellow, and green. A small model of a black cruise ship with four red smokestacks. Small model of an orange, early 20th century electric trolley car
A mid-20th century home kitchen filled with cooking implements. One side of the room has been replaced by plexiglass to allow for easy viewing. Looking into a mid-20th century kitchen through the window above the kitchen sink. A small white dish with a blue floral design on the size and a clear glass lid.

I first visited “Food: Transforming the American Table”. The most famous section was Julia Child’s home kitchen, which is arranged exactly as it appeared during her life. Other sections included the history of agriculture in the United States and inventions that improved home cooking, such as a 1970s coneflower CorningWare dish identical to one I have at home. My stay in “Food” was relatively brief compared to the next section.

A wall of matching brass pots and pans Looking into a mid-20th century kitchen with a kitchen table covered with a bright yellow tablecloth. A plain concrete and red brick open-air train station with neoclassical inspired arches.

For anyone who loves trains, trolleys, horses, and vintage bicycles, this exhibit is a piece of paradise. “America on the Move” combined traditional displays with life-size dioramas and interactives. When visiting a replica of a train station from the Southern Railway, visitors could hear train arrival announcements and conversations of the mannequins seated on the bench. Another fun experience was a bus ride. Visitors walk onto a platform and take a seat inside a parked bus with its doors removed. A video on one end of the bus showed fellow travelers dressed in early to mid-20th century clothing. These passengers discussed their day, giving visitors a peek into their lives. The video ran on a very long loop, giving visitors the chance to rest if desired.

A pair of young man mannequins and a dog mannequin meander around an early 20th century red car, which has driven into a ditch. Live-sized diorama of a young man with an early 20th century bicycle walking near a horse. A bright orange early 20th century motorcycle
A bright red early 20th century pickup truck with a wooden fence around the truck bed. A light-up overhead display with oversized postcards depicting stops on US Route 66. Below are a pair of 1930s era vehicles A white horse mannequin attached to a green painted wagon.

This exhibit did a great job demonstrating how transportation technology changed gradually and different technologies overlapped. For example, dioramas might show a horse-drawn wagon beside a train, a bicycle, or an early automobile. I also learned more about how developing highway systems alongside improved cars led to much more travel within a few decades. A diorama called “Crossing the Country: Somewhere in Wyoming, 1903” showed how early cars were prone to break down. A pair of young men, H. Nelson Jackson and Sewall K. Crocker, and their dog Bud stand around their Winton touring car, which they need to pull out of the ditch. They would make the trip from the West to East Coast in sixty-three days at a cost of $8,000, the first people to drive across the country in a car. Jackson donated the car to the Smithsonian.

Mannequin of a trolley conductor stands at the from of a bright yellow trolley while three passenger mannequins wait to get on. Mannequin of a teenage girl stands on the porch of a small, roadside cabin and questions a mannequin of a middle-aged business man. His mid-20th century car is parked on the left. An oversized blue-and-white map showing the route of US 1A along the coast of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine.
Mannequin of a tired dad reading a newspaper and sitting in a lawn chair behind an orange-and-brown mid-20th century camper van. Mannequin of a father and child stand near a mid-20th century orange truck. Mannequin children play around a green station wagon with wood paneling.

Another fascinating story involved roadside cabins, which were built in communities next to the developing highways. The diorama depicts “Ring’s Rest, Muirkirk, Maryland, 1930s” operated by the Ringe family along U.S. 1. During the audio, which plays automatically, young Carolyn Ringe screens a business man before she can permit him to stay at the cabins, as the Ringe family was very careful about who was allowed to stay at their upscale venue. The cabin is a restored original building from the property. A nearby map showed U.S. 1A winding north through New England, a classic drive from the 1950s. Of course, this is not as famous as Route 66, which connects Chicago, IL to Los Angeles, CA with over 2,000 miles of road. Once called “The People’s Highway”, the “Mother Road”, and “Main Street of America ”, the highway thrived on tourist traps but has since been bypassed by larger highways. Today, it is mostly remembered by the song “Get Your Kicks on Route 66” and the Disney Pixar movie Cars.

Early 18-wheeler cab Two mannequins ride motorcycles while several makes of vehicles are parked around them, indicating a busy street. A mannequin peers into the window of a car dealership where a nice car sits on display.
A little black engine with a red cowcatcher and a red coal car Motorcycle and cars parked near a mannequin standing in front of the vehicles as if diverting traffic. Mid-20th century car with a sleek design like a silver bullet and trendy whitewall tires with a streak of red

My two favorite objects in this section were the Jupiter Steam Locomotive of the Santa Cruz Railroad and the Tucker Car. The cute little train was built for narrow-gauge tracks and was phased out for being to small for standard gauge tracks. After over sixty years spent shunting bananas through Guatemala, which is evidently more appreciative of little trains, the Smithsonian got the train back as part of the 1976 bicentennial celebrations, meaning that the train has lives in the museum for almost fifty years: not a bad retirement. The 1948 Preston Tucker sedan has a sleek design like a silver bullet and trendy whitewall tires with a streak of red. On top of its good looks, an emphasis on safety sold the car. However, Tucker produced only fifty-one and declared bankruptcy due to poor business practices. The Francis Ford Coppola film Tucker: The Man and His Dream was somewhat too sympathetic towards the inventor but is a good way to understand the basics of the story.

A green and white mid-20th century bus. A life-sized bus station with a parked bus. Its doors have been taken off to allow visitors easy access on and off the bus. Mannequin of a shipping container worker wearing a one-piece work suit and a hard hat while carrying a furnace. He walks away from a stack of shipping containers.