Smithsonian to unveil new America 250 exhibit this week

WASHINGTON (Gray DC) - The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History is marking America’s 250th anniversary with a new exhibit this week, that showcases how the country is connected through natural history.

The museum will unveil its “From These Lands: Sharing Our Natural and Cultural Heritage,” exhibit on Thursday, featuring 600 pieces collected from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and five U.S. territories, including fossils, insects, minerals and more.

“It’s meant to really bring you into this idea of our nation as a very diverse nation from the point of view of natural history and cultural history,” said Kirk Johnson, the museum’s Sant director.

The exhibit is weaved together through themes, showing American’s ties.

“What this does that exemplifies one of the themes we try to have in this exhibit is it shows the connections between people and nature,” said Torben Rick, co-curator of the exhibit.

Museum leaders also said in a press release that the exhibit was created to give visitors a chance to celebrate and reflect on the U.S.’s natural world.

Co-curator Stewart Edie said one part of the exhibit, an animation called Connected by Nature, uses maps to highlight the connection theme.

“What it does is it gives you this initial context of the positions of the U.S. states, and then what we do through the animation is we slowly dissolve away those boundaries, and we overlay natural contours of our landscapes,” Edie said. “So we see that we have these shared connections to our natural features.”

The exhibit is set to stay on display at the museum through December 2029.