Color: Black and White; Size: 10w x 8h; Type of Image: Interior; Medium: Photographic print
Type:
Photographic print
Interior
Date:
c. late 1800s
Category:
Historic Images of the Smithsonian
Notes:
The original negative number is MAH-6079.
Summary:
An office located in the U.S. National Museum Building, now the Arts and Industries Building, shows bookcases, cuspidor and three men seated at desks, around the late 1800s. One man has his back to the camera and one man is leaning back in his chair reading with his feet up on the desk. Note that the ceiling light fixture is missing a shade. There is a "portable" gas lamp on top of the cabinet, left corner of the room. It has a rubber hose attached to it that fits onto the burner jet of the chandelier allowing for the lamp to be used on the desk top. They were fairly common and were sold en-suite with chandeliers.
The press on the window sill is either a book press or a letter press for making copies of handwritten letters. The bookcase is one of the ones that were on the balcony of the Great Hall of the Smithsonian Institution Building after the exhibit cases were removed and the balcony was used for laboratories. The large framed picture (right rear) was from Spencer Fullerton Baird's Castle first floor office when he was Assistant Secretary. It is titled "Flora of the Rocky Mountains."
Contained within:
Smithsonian Institution Archives, Record Unit 95, Box 31A, Folder 19
