During the workshop, students created three-dimensional models of original inventions or innovations after a guided tour of the museum's exhibition on African American inventors titled 'The Real McCoy: Afro-American Invention and Innovation 1619-1930.' Workshop was recommended for third and fourth grade students. The workshop was held at the Anacostia Museum on February 5, 1990.
Workshop. Related to exhibition 'The Real McCoy: Afro-American Invention and Innovation 1619-1930.' AV002113 and AV002116: dated 19900205. AV002058: undated.
Biographical / Historical:
The exhibition - The Real McCoy: African-American Invention and Innovation, 1619-1930 - focused on outstanding black inventors, as well as anonymous innovators, who, as slaves, craftsmen and workers, made important contributions to the United States. Included are actual inventions, such an Jan Matzelieger's "shoe-lasting" machine, which revolutionized shoe production, and Garrett Morgan's safety hood and automatic traffic signal, forerunners of the modern gas mask and traffic stop light. The exhibition examines such topics as African influences on Colonial technology and how the slave system stymied technological innovation. Individual inventors such as Lewis Temple, Elijah McCoy, James Forten, and Norbert Rillieux are profiled. Also featured are artifacts from some of the expositions of the late 19th-century, which celebrated this new surge of black inventiveness. The exhibition was curated by Portia James and organized by the Anacostia Museum. It was held at the museum from May 1989 - May 1990.
Local Numbers:
ACMA AV002116
ACMA AV002058
General:
Title transcribed from physical asset and calendar of events for Jan/Feb 1990.
Series Restrictions:
Use of the materials requires an appointment. Some items are not accessible due to obsolete format and playback machinery restrictions. Please contact the archivist at acmarchives@si.edu.
overall: 11 3/4 in x 3 3/4 in x 3 3/4 in; 29.845 cm x 9.525 cm x 9.525 cm
Object Name:
mining lamp
lamp, safety, mining
Related Publication:
Dewey, Frederic P.. Bulletin of the United States National Museum No. 42: A Preliminary Descriptive Catalogue of the Systematic Collections in Economic Geology and Metallurgy in the United States National Museum