Smithsonian poster for “Americans” exhibit that will open at Edison and Ford Winter Estates on Dec. 12. PROVIDED<\/p>\n
Edison and Ford Winter Estates will host the Smithsonian traveling exhibit \u201cAmericans\u201d from Dec. 12 through Feb. 6. The exhibition from the Smithsonian\u2019s Museum on Main Street and the National Museum of the American Indian explores how deeply intertwined American Indians are in the history, popular culture and identity of the United States. <\/p>\n
With support from Florida Humanities, EFWE will present a Wednesday-evening lecture series throughout January and early February, along with \u201cStep Into History\u201d talks exploring Native American heritage. The initiative will also feature a new Ethnobotany Trail highlighting indigenous plants and their cultural significance in Florida.<\/p>\n
EFWE and the surrounding community were chosen by the Florida Humanities to host \u201cAmericans\u201d as part of the Museum on Main Street program \u2014 a national partnership to bring exhibitions and programs to cultural organizations. The exhibition will tour five communities in Florida through June 2027.<\/p>\n
Based on a major exhibition at the Smithsonian\u2019s National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C., \u201cAmericans\u201d highlights the ways in which American Indians have been part of the nation\u2019s identity since before the country began. Images of American Indians are everywhere, from imagery on commercial products and professional and high school sports mascots, to classic Westerns and episodes of Seinfeld and South Park. Indian names are everywhere too, from state, city and street names to the Tomahawk missile. Beyond these images and names are familiar historical events and stories \u2014 Thanksgiving, Pocahontas, the Trail of Tears and Battle of Little Bighorn \u2014 that have become part of everyday conversation.<\/p>\n
Through photographs, hands-on interactives, objects and videos, the exhibition offers a new way of understanding a country forever fascinated, conflicted and shaped by its relationship with American Indians. A short, animated film, \u201cThe Invention of Thanksgiving,\u201d provides a whimsical take on how a simple meal shared between Native Americans and early English settlers evolved into a central part of America\u2019s traditional origin story and a national holiday.<\/p>\n
The exhibition examines three stories that are part of American national consciousness and popular culture. The first is devoted to Pocahontas, the young Powhatan woman who played a key role in saving the colony of Jamestown. Another story explores the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Signed by President Andrew Jackson, the act envisioned a United States without Indians. One of the boldest and most far-reaching laws in American history, removal transformed the country-generating great wealth for the nation and catastrophe for Native Americans. The third looks at the complicated story of the Battle of Little Bighorn, also known as Custer\u2019s Last Stand. \u201cAmericans\u201d explores how these events have been remembered and represented throughout the years.<\/p>\n
The exhibition title is a play on words and nods to the name originally given to this country\u2019s Indigenous inhabitants by Europeans. It is meant not only as a reminder of the primacy of American Indians in the territory known as the United States but also of the tangled relationship between Indians and the people now called Americans.<\/p>\n
Support for \u201cAmericans\u201d is provided by the Smithsonian\u2019s Our Shared Future: 250, a Smithsonian-wide initiative commemorating the nation\u2019s 250th. Signature support for Smithsonian\u2019s Our Shared Future: 250 has been provided by Lilly Endowment Inc. Additional generous contributions have been made by Target.<\/p>\n
About Museum on Main Street (MoMS)<\/p>\n
MoMS is a collaboration of the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service | Smithsonian Affiliations and state partner organizations. It serves museums, libraries and historical societies in rural areas, where about one-fifth of all Americans live. The partnership brings exhibitions, educational resources and programming to small towns across America. MoMS has visited all 50 U.S. states as well as Guam and inspired more than 1,900 towns to rediscover their local histories while finding a renewed sense of community pride. Visit online at museumonmainstreet.org<\/a> .<\/p>\n About Edison and Ford Winter Estates<\/p>\n Edison and Ford Winter Estates (EFWE) is the internationally known winter home site of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford. More than 200,000 visitors walk through the location each year from all around the globe. EFWE is accredited by the American Alliance of Museums. The site has received the National Stewardship Award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation and the National Garden Clubs\u2019 Historic Preservation Award. The property is an official project of \u201cSave America\u2019s Treasures,\u201d a Florida Historic Landmark and a National Register Historic Site. The Edison Botanic Laboratory is a National Historic Chemical Landmark. The site is open every day except Thanksgiving and Christmas from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. and until 9 p.m. during Holiday Nights.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Smithsonian poster for “Americans” exhibit that will open at Edison and Ford Winter Estates on Dec. 12. PROVIDED…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395340,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[209,211,210],"class_list":["post-395339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}