Object of History: Behind the Scene with the National Museum of American History

The Object of History is a cooperative project between the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media. The project was conceived of in an effort to find a low cost way for students and teacher of U.S. History to have access to the museum’s collections and the expertise of the curators. As a result the materials on the site are designed to improve students’ content knowledge of standard topics in U.S. History and to improve their ability to understand material culture objects as types of historical evidence.

A second goal of the project is to provide smaller museums and historical societies with a model for creating similar materials using their own collections and expertise. Hence, in January 2008, we will offer a downloadable package that will include templates, a database structure, and a guide to creating object lessons using the software. This free package will be available to all interested users and will be composed using open source software.