For Immediate Release
For More Information Contact:
Elaine Wilner (215) 599-4283 or
[email protected]
America’s First “Attic”
New Exhibition Reveals Treasures from Philadelphia’s Oldest New Museum
Philadelphia, PA, January 5, 2005...The Smithsonian Institution calls itself “the
nation’s attic,” chock full of the Hope Diamond, Dorothy’s ruby slippers, First Ladies’
gowns, and Duke Ellington’s musical manuscripts—all kept for posterity. But, before
the nation’s center of gravity moved to Washington, Philadelphia was its capital and
the American Philosophical Society (APS) functioned as the first national library,
museum, academy of science and “attic.” A new exhibition Treasures Revealed: 260
Years of Collecting at the American Philosophical Society, opening on February 18,
2005, flings open the “attic” door to present highlights from this remarkable
collection. Visitors will see important documents, scientific specimens, patent
models, portraits, maps, rare books and manuscripts—not to mention—painter’s
palettes, lantern slides, Sumatran writing sticks and silhouettes of famous patriots
from Peale’s Museum—treasured objects that held the same fascination for our
ancestors that Dorothy’s slippers have for people today.
The Museum of the American Philosophical Society
Three years ago, the American Philosophical Society (APS), still one of the
nation’s pre-eminent scholarly organizations, instituted a museum exhibition
program designed to show off the Society’s wide-ranging and idiosyncratic collection
of more than 300,000 books, eight million manuscripts, art works and objects. This
new museum with an old and venerable provenance opens its latest exhibition,
Treasures Revealed, in the jewel-box gallery on the first floor of historic
Philosophical Hall. Seventy-five carefully selected items, many on view for the first
time, were chosen to illustrate not only the breadth of the Society’s holdings, from
early American patriots to astronauts on the moon, but the institution’s particular
interest in the history of science, medicine and technology. The materials on display
evoke a cavalcade of superlatives—“unique,” “rare,” “one-of-a kind,” not to mention
“intriguing,” “odd,” and downright “bizarre.” Among the most notable Treasures are:
•
John Dunlap’s printing of the Declaration of Independence on vellum.
Dunlap’s print shop had prepared the first printing—on paper—of the
Declaration on July 4, 1776. Several days later he printed the
Declaration again on vellum, a more durable material than paper. This
is the only known vellum copy.
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• A nineteenth-century book bound in human skin.
Recent scholarship has revealed that this book, written in Chinese,
contains the first books of the New Testament.
• Patent models including John Fitch’s 1785 paddle-driven boat.
John Fitch made the first successful trial of a steamboat on the
Delaware River on August 22, 1787.
• Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of President George Washington painted in 1797.
• “Spirit” photographs including a picture by 19th-century French artist Felix
Nadar purporting to show a man and his aura.
• John von Neumann’s holograph of the first stored computer program.
The Treasures
Treasures Revealed is divided into eight themed sections that illuminate the
American Philosophical Society’s formative role in American history and the history
of science in America.
On view in the first section, “Building A Nation,” are William Penn’s Charter of
Privileges (1701), which granted religious liberty to all residents of Pennsylvania; a
hand drawn battle map of Yorktown (1781), the climatic battle of the Revolutionary
War; and the Treaty of Easton (1757), an agreement, spelled out in words and
pictograms, specifying that local Shawnee and Lenape tribes would not fight for the
French in the French and Indian War.
“Mixed Media” showcases the eclectic nature of this sui generis collection. It
contains not only artist Rembrandt Peale’s color palettes but also Sumatran bamboo
writing sticks, a beautifully-bound Book of Death (1819) and a volume on moths
titled As Nature Shows Them: Butterflies and Moths of North America (1900) with
sumptuous plates printed from the insects’ wings.
Before there was photography, silhouettes were the easy way to get an image
of a loved-one or a famous person. Some “Portrait Profiles” like those of visitors
“Hannah and Phineas” from Peale’s Museum, America’s first successful museum—
also located in Philosophical Hall—belong to the APS. Skull sketches and photos
taken by eugenics fieldworkers are also on view, reflecting Society members’
investigations of physiognomy, craniometry, and human genetics.
Benjamin Franklin established the American Philosophical Society in 1743 to
“promote useful knowledge.” In 1785, Jean-Hyacinthe Magellan gave Franklin the
opportunity to put money behind his idea when he donated 200 guineas to the APS
to establish a yearly scientific prize for the best discovery or useful improvement.
The winner received a solid-gold plate dubbed the Magellanic Premium. Contestants
submitted miniature models for consideration by the prize committee. Many of these
beautifully made and precisely detailed examples remain in the collection and are on
view in the section “A Mechanical Age.” Models range from an eminently practical
cheese press and a polygraph “copy machine” designed to create two copies of a
written manuscript simultaneously to a fanciful model of a wind-driven carriage
submitted by a Lancaster, PA, gunsmith.
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The final sections of the exhibition trace the Society’s continuing interest in
science and natural history. “Hands-On Science” traces science with a small “s” as
practiced by professionals and amateurs alike with examples of an 18th-century book
of geometry models, instructions on beekeeping (accompanied by humorous
sketches), a Journal of Astronomical Observations (1845-1858), detailed drawings
of geological strata, and sketches of the classification of orders, families, and genera
of fish.
In the “Space Age,” “Big Science,” and “Life Science” sections, science is the
province of experts. The Lick Observatory Atlas of the Moon (1895), blueprints for
ENIAC, the world’s first electronic digital computer, iconic photos of mushroom
clouds over Bikini Atoll, and innovative molecular maps created by Philadelphia
crystallographer A. Lindo Patterson take the APS to the cusp of the 21st century.
Artist-Naturalist Sue Johnson
Following in the footsteps of the great artist-naturalists like John James
Audubon and Mark Catesby, artist Sue Johnson has made the observation and study
of the natural world the focus of her work. Johnson, who teaches at St. Mary’s
College of Maryland on the western shore, was invited to create “visual stories” for
the exhibition. Her work, dispersed throughout the show, interprets and reinterprets the historical record presented in Treasures. Her 21st-century take on
themes such as silhouettes, natural history drawings, moon mania, and atomic
bomb testing are mounted alongside artifacts on display. They are intended, she
says, “to create a parallel universe” of art objects that both comment on and
challenge conventional wisdom.
Second Sundays At APS
On March 13th, April 10th, and May 8th, the Museum of the American
Philosophical Society is open from 2-4 p.m. for family-oriented hands-on activities
based on some of the extraordinary objects in the Treasures exhibition.
Information
Treasures Revealed: 260 Years of Collecting at the American Philosophical Society
will be on view in Philosophical Hall, 104 S. Fifth Street from February 18 –
December 31, 2005.
Hours: Thursday – Sunday
10 a.m. – 4 p.m. (to Labor Day)
Wednesday
5 p.m. – 8 p.m. (April – Labor Day)
Friday – Sunday
10 a.m. – 4 p.m. (Labor Day – Dec. 31)
Admission is free.
Digital Images Available Upon Request
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Founded by Benjamin Franklin in 1743, “to promote useful knowledge,” The
American Philosophical Society served in the first half century of the republic as a
national library, museum and academy of science. Today, the Society continues as
an eminent scholarly organization of world-wide reputation, renowned for its
excellence in scholarly research and publications, its extraordinary manuscript
library and its international roster of elected members who make up a veritable
“Who’s Who” of outstanding individuals in the arts, humanities and the sciences.
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