This Belongs in a Museum
Bringing you museum-approved grammatical errors and typos since 2010.
Oh, and sorry - I DO NOT FOLLOW BACK!
Artist Dorr Bothwell’s sketch of visitors at the San Francisco Art Museum in 1942, part of “A Day at the Museum”, a museum exhibit about museum exhibits at the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art, open through 2 June 2013. Some of the items on display include famous artists’ letters, recorded stories, diary entries as well as sketches and photographs of museum visitors.
I know the middle of December isn’t the best time to share camping stories, but I say why the hell not? A few times a year my friends and I drove up to the Wisconsin Woods, usually in April and October. We liked to do it old school style hanging out next to the fire all night drinking and eating crap food and sleeping on the ground (sorry no cot/airbed cheaters allowed!). Anyway, I haven’t been back since I returned home with ticks living inside my hair. A traumatizing experience I will not soon forget. So don’t count on me visiting the World’s Largest Tick Collection anytime soon. It is actually owned and curated by the Smithsonian Institution, with many of its specimens dating back to the late 1800s, but is housed at Georgia Southern University in Statesboro as part of the Institute of Arthropodology and Parasitology. With over 1 million ticks of every size and color, the official U.S. National Tick Collection as it is called has rows and rows of drawers and cabinets, each packed with carefully labeled bottles. There is a machine that freeze dries the ticks, and some are even coated with gold, which helps for better viewing under the electron microscopes. About 850 distinct species of tick exist across the globe. I bet you didn’t know that. Or probably didn’t know you’d be reading so much about them today. Well, I’m not done. Why should anyone care about the world’s most complete tick collection? Because ticks spread diseases (Lyme disease and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever are notable examples) and scientists want to better understand how these creatures live and co-evolve with their hosts. Shit’s important yo. And if you didn’t think arachnid lovers have a sense of humor, the “museum” is decorated with tick paintings, tick mosaics and stained glass tick windows. Well, if you don’t have the creepy-crawlies after reading this post, then go check this place out. It’s open to the public every Wednesday and by appointment.
HAPPY GROUNDHOG DAY!
Groundhog Skeleton, Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC
Electronic Superhighway: Continental U.S.by Nam June Paik, 1995.
National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
One of my closest friends is a Monopoly collector. She has like a gazillion versions of the game, including vintage and digital ones. I remember when we were walking down the Strip with a “Las Vegas” version in our possession. Some random dude yelled at us, “Hey, what are you going to do? Go back to your hotel room and play that? You’re in a city full of games.” How right you are, sir. And I think directly after that incident we bumped into an “Old Elvis” and the rest is Las Vegas history…well, if Vegas actually had a history. Anyway, I hope my friend never buys this next Monopoly.
At the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History there’s a Monopoly game made of 18-karat solid gold and encrusted with priceless jewels worth 2 million dollars. The set of dice is worth 10,000 dollars alone. Why so much, you ask? Well, the number dots aren’t just regular old dots, but full-cut diamonds. 165 gemstones make up the properties on the board, while the “Chance” and “Community Chest” cards have been photo-etched. The Smithsonian received the game as one of twenty jeweled art objects from the personal collection of world-renowned artist and jeweler Sidney Mobell. Last fall the Museum of American Finance, an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution, had a Monopoly tournament to celebrate the special Monopoly becoming part of a temporary display at their Wall Street location. So what happens if you land on Free Parking? House rules say I get to take this baby home…I could pay off more than a few bills with the diamonds and buy a house with that gold.
P.S. Making expensive board games is totally a thing. Who knew?
