Generations D.C.

Even Washington, D.C.’s most iconic sites hold lesser-known histories. Generations D.C. highlights some of the individuals and communities across time who have shaped these places into what they are today.

Stories embedded within places, like the Smithsonian Castle and the Washington Monument, reveal people and moments sometimes left out of dominant historical accounts. At the White House, for example, the exhibition explores Theodore Roosevelt’s 1901 dinner with Booker T. Washington, the first formal social invitation extended to an African American, as well as the work of Lorraine Waxman Pearce, the first White House curator, whose efforts helped shape how the building’s history is preserved and shared.

The artworks and artifacts in this exhibition were researched by students at the George Washington University. Many participated in Professor Max van Balgooy’s course Interpreting Historic Sites and House Museums, where they had the opportunity to write story labels as an assignment. Additional texts were developed by student employees at the museum’s Albert H. Small Center for National Capital Area Studies. Together, these students represent an emerging generation of museum professionals who are working to interpret Washington’s layered histories. 

Acknowledgements

This exhibition was organized by the Albert H. Small Center for National Capital Area Studies with support from the Albert and Shirley Small Family Foundation.