National Postal Museum

1972 Peace Corps Stamp Artist David Battle Visits Museum

By, Patricia Raynor, Loan Coordinator

David Battle, whose design concept was used for the 1972 Peace Corps Stamp, visited the Postal Museum on April 12. Jim O’Donnell and I interviewed Mr. Battle in 2010 for an article on the Peace Corps stamp and were delighted when he contacted us that he was planning a visit to Washington, DC. While at the museum, Mr. Battle spoke fondly of his visit to Washington in December of 1971 when and his family were invited to attend the ceremony announcing the Peace Corps stamp.

Peace Corps stamp issued February 11, 1972

 

David Battle also designed the cachet for the 1971 first day cover that he is holding.

The National Postal Museum has the original Peace Corps stamp art on loan from the U.S. Postal Service’s, Postmaster General Collection. Annette Shumway, museum technician PMG Collection, brought out the art for him to examine in person.  He showed us how graphic artist Bradbury Thompson added an extra dove in the adaptation for the final design as the design of the Peace Corps stamp was vertical and his original design was square.

 

 

David Battle examining the 1972 Peace Corps stamp art with Annette Shumway overseeing on the right.

Bradbury Thompson note from the National Postal Museum Library, Third Assistant Postmaster General, Stamp Design Files.

David Battle lives in Ohio with his wife Esther.  His art frequently appears in the Antioch Review.

Photographs by James O’Donnell

To learn more check out:
David Battle and the story behind the Peace Corps stamp
http://postalmuseum.si.edu/museum/1d_peace_corps_stamp.html

The Postmaster General Collection
http://postalmuseumblog.si.edu/2012/07/the-postmaster-general-collection.html
                                

Remembering the Titanic

By Daniel Piazza, Philately Department

This year’s anniversary of Titanic’s sinking is a pretty low-key affair. Last year was the centenary, and there were hundreds of commemorations all over the world that garnered a lot of media attention. Everyone is interested in a hundredth anniversary, but a hundred-and-first somehow does not seem as important.

A crowd will gather at the Washington, D.C. Titanic memorial, as they do every year, but it will be a fraction of the three to four hundred who showed up last year at midnight.

If you don’t want to venture to the Southeast waterfront, you can instead come to the National Postal Museum and see original sketches of the memorial by its sculptor, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, on loan to us from the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.

 

Loan from Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution

Even if you have viewed Fire & Ice before, a number of new pieces were installed in January that make it worth a second look. The National Archives in New York has loaned us a manual of ship’s regulations that once belonged to Titanic survivor and White Star Line managing director J. Bruce Ismay. Published in 1907, the book was standard issue on all ships belonging to the International Mercantile Marine Co., including Titanic. We have opened it to the page dealing with “Custody of the Mails.”

 

 

Loan from National Archives and Records Administration (New York)

One of the most famous radio transmissions of all time is memorialized on this Marconi company form from Olympic’s radio room. At 1:13 a.m., one hour and forty minutes after striking an iceberg, Titanic tells Olympic, “We are putting the passengers off in small boats.” This was one of the last intelligible messages sent by Titanic. “N.Y.T.” stands for “New York Time,” which Second Officer Charles Lightoller reckoned was 1 hour and 33 minutes behind Titanic’s time.

 

On loan from Dr. Edward and Joanne Dauer.

Chicago physician Frank Blackmarr, a passenger aboard Carpathia when that ship received Titanic’s distress signals, assisted the ship’s surgeon treating survivors. He collected numerous relics of the disaster, including the autographs and addresses of Titanic’s four surviving officers. The autographs, from top to bottom, are: Fourth Officer James Graves Boxhall; Second Officer Charles Herbert Lightoller; and Fifth Officer Harold Godfrey Lowe. Third Officer Herbert John Pitman signed on a separate sheet (not shown).

 

 

Loan from Brian, Maria, and Alexander Green

So, even though the “big anniversary” is behind us, a visit to Fire & Ice at the National Postal Museum is a new opportunity to learn about the disaster and reflect on the enormity of Titanic’s loss.    

 

Secrets of the William H. Gross Stamp Gallery

By Cheryl Ganz, Philately Department

When visitors come to the opening of the William H. Gross Stamp Gallery on Sunday, September 22, they will see stamp rarities, learn wonderful stories about stamps and mail, and experience philately in ways they never imagined. But one thing they will not see is a small, flat box hidden behind the walls in the post office’s old vault space!

On February 28, 2013, Allen Kane, NPM director (above-left); Glen Hopkins, design and construction manager (center); and Cheryl Ganz, lead curator (right), hid a time capsule. The staff and Council of Philatelists (a museum advisory board of top stamp collectors) contributed to the contents with signed business cards, philatelic journals and artifacts, museum publications and ephemera, and tokens of life in America in 2013. A message inside to those who someday will open the time capsule tells them that it was stowed in memory of W. Wilson Hulme (1946-2007), the Chief Curator of Philately who dreamed of a Philatelic Center of Excellence but died before the William H. Gross Stamp Gallery was conceived.

John Hotchner, Council of Philatelists, Signing Stairwell.

In addition to the time capsule, during construction, staff and the Council of Philatelists signed beams and the stairwell recently put in place by Clark Construction Group. Many left messages so that, if the building is ever dismantled, future generations will know how very excited we all are to share the creation of the world's largest postage stamp gallery.

Staff Members Signing Beam.

 

 

USPS Unveils Inverted Jenny Stamp

Director of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum Allen Kane and USPS Director of Stamp Services and Corporate Licensing Susan McGowan unveiled the preliminary design for an Inverted Jenny stamp at the APS AmeriStamp Expo stamp show in Louisville, Kentucky today (Friday, January 18, 2013).

 

$2 Stamp Collecting: Inverted Jenny Stamp (Stamp design reflects preliminary artwork and is subject to change.)

The preliminary design includes replicas of America’s most famous stamp and one of the world’s most famous errors. The margins of the stamp sheet feature images related to the 24-cent Curtiss Jenny stamp and the 1918 inaugural airmail service, including pilot Major Reuben Fleet of the Army Air Corps and the Washington DC – Philadelphia - New York airmail flight route. In the upper left corner is the main post office in Washington, DC, at the time, which would process airmail and currently houses the National Postal Museum.

This famous U.S. stamp printing error occurred at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing during the week of May 6-13, 1918. One sheet of one hundred stamps with an inverted image of a blue airplane escaped detection. The error occurred either when an inverted carmine frame sheet

The 24-cent Curtiss Jenny invert error

was fed into the small hand press for the second impression or when the plate printer, after inking and wiping, placed an inverted blue vignette plate into the press. The biplane featured in the design is the famous JN-4-H "Jenny," modified by replacing the front cockpit with a mail compartment.

Another post office in Washington, DC, sold the error sheet on May 14, 1918, to William T. Robey. The lucky collector sold it to Eugene Klein, a Philadelphia stamp dealer, for $15,000. Klein then sold the sheet to collector Colonel H.R. Green and recommended breaking the sheet into blocks and singles to sell. The entire discovery and sales received enormous press.

The new stamp sheet will be issued on September 22, opening day of the National Postal Museum’s William H. Gross Stamp Gallery. The Gross Stamp Gallery will be the world’s largest stamp gallery. A block of four of the original 1918 Inverted Jenny will be on permanent display courtesy of Bill Gross.

 

 Click here for USPS press release.

First-Day Ceremony: Emancipation Proclamation Commemorative Forever Stamp

By: Calvin Mitchell, NPM Research Associate

On January 1, 2013 at 9:00 A.M. the United States Postal Service (USPS) held the first- day ceremony for the Emancipation Proclamation commemorative forever stamp in the magnificent Rotunda Gallery of the National Archives.  The selection of January 1, 2013 as the first- day of issue was historically consistent as the date marked the 150th Anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation by President Abraham Lincoln. Scheduling the first- day ceremony on New Year’s Day resulted in the stamp’s release on a Federal holiday, which is a rare event, but scheduling the first- day ceremony at the National Archives allowed this momentous event to become an integral part the 150th Anniversary celebration from Sunday, December 30-Tuesday, January 1.

A’Lelia Bundles, President of the Foundation for the National Archives, served as the Master Of Ceremonies. She recognized the importance of the ceremony to stamp collectors by asking how many people in the audience were stamp collectors, which resulted in a significant number of people raising their hands.  She used this occasion to pay homage to her own ancestors who were enslaved at the time the Emancipation Proclamation was signed. She also read a stirring proclamation issued from “another president,” President Obama, which commemorated the sesquicentennial anniversary of the signing.

Ms. Bundles was followed by David S. Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, who began his presentation by saying “Welcome to my house.” During his brief speech he cited the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation as a document that added a moral dimension to the Civil War.

Ronald Stroman, the Deputy Postmaster General representing the USPS, gave the keynote address and spoke about the importance of the Emancipation Proclamation in changing the “arc of history” forever in America and the enduring significance the document holds in American history. “It is a legacy we choose not only to remember, but also to make our own.”  The unveiling ceremony occurred after his brief remarks.

After the unveiling Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, who is a singer, composer, and founder of the a cappella group, Sweet Honey in the Rock, opened her presentation with a very brief but beautiful hymn. She followed with a dramatic reading of the original Emancipation Proclamation. The presentation closed with a stirring performance by the Washington Revels Jubilee Voices. The group enthralled the audience with spirituals and gospel music sung by African Americans during the Civil War period. At the conclusion of the ceremony, which lasted about 45 minutes, attendees were given the rare opportunity to view the original Emancipation Proclamation displayed in the East Rotunda Gallery.

Button produced by the US National Archives and distributed to the general public during the 150th Anniversary events.

 

Program prepared for the first- day ceremony held on August 16, 1963 in Chicago, Illinois for the release of the stamp commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation. This stamp shown on the program was designed by Greg Olden, who was the first African American to design a US postal stamp.

 

First- Day Program, signed by Gail Anderson, the stamp designer. Copies of the programs were found on the seats when attendees entered the Rotunda.

Post Ceremonial Activities

After the event the, USPS set- up shop in the National Archives’ Bookstore to sell philatelic products related to the stamp’s release and provide collectors with three different postmarks: a pictorial postmark, a bull’s eye postmark and a regular four bar first- day of issue postmark.   As usual, collectors will have to mail in items and pay (fifty cents per item) to receive the digital postmark.   Interestingly enough, a number of collectors actually had entire panes autographed by the stamp designer and postmarked at the Archives.  Moreover, sales at the postal service counter were very brisk. The postal service reported that attendees purchased $6000 of philatelic items.

Gail Anderson was spotted purchasing philatelic items from the postal service and was sought out for her autograph, which she gladly provided upon request.

 

Set of three Artcraft covers (above) prepared for the issuance of the 1963 Emancipation Proclamation Stamp I used to obtain the pictorial postmark designed for the issuance of the 150th Anniversary Stamp. I had the stamp designer for the 150th Anniversary Stamp autograph the cover. Note the two varieties in the circular postmarks used on the 1963 centennial stamp.

 

First day cover sold at the ceremony by the USPS and autographed by the stamp designer.

 

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage

Hispanic Americans in the Postal Service and Philately

Since the first Spanish explorers and settlers landed in the Americas, Hispanic and Latino people have shaped the history and culture of the United States. Today, Hispanic and Latino people continue to demonstrate excellence in many areas including politics, public service, music, film, sports, business, science, and the military. The National Postal Museum is proud to recognize the significant contributions of these people and related events though various online exhibits.

Mexico Via Airmail
The Mexican government exported nationalism through images of nature and technology in harmony, comparisons of ancient and contemporary art and culture, and the mix of Ancient Mayan hieroglyphics and fiesta colors with 1960s op-art typography in the 1968 Olympic Games graphic designs. The exhibit is bilingual and features both stamps and mail of Mexico.

                 

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage: People, Places and Events on stamps
Stamps illuminate what we value as a people and a culture, and the National Postal Museum’s Celebrating Hispanic Heritage: People, Places and Events on Stamps sheds new light on the many contributions of Hispanic Americans and Latinos to the exploration, culture, growth, and defense of the United States.  (Celebrating Hispanic Heritage en español)

 

 

 

 

The Pichs Collection: Cuba’s Postal and Aviation History
This virtual exhibition Exploring Cuba’s Postal History, 1830-1939, through the Roberto Pichs Collections is an overview of Cuba’s postal history from the pre-philatelic period to 1939. It includes “folded letters” (pre-philatelic covers), stamped envelopes, and historic postcards, which have never before been published. The virtual exhibition Cuba’s Commercial Aviation History and the Pichs Collection is especially strong in depictions of the history of aviation, including many envelopes commemorative of events in Cuba’s aviation history.

The Great One: Roberto Clemente Walker
Roberto Clemente Walker has been honored on a US postage stamp twice. The first stamp honoring this great baseball player appeared August 17, 1984. He was selected again as a stamp subject in 2000, for the Legends of Baseball series.  (The Great One en español)

"Ask a Curator Day” at the National Postal Museum

By Katie Burke, Museum Technician


Ever wondered what really goes on behind the scenes at the National Postal Museum? Not sure what a curator is or does? Here’s your chance to get all your questions answered!
Ask a Curator Day (www.askacuratorday.com), a worldwide Q&A with dozens of participating museums, is Wednesday, September 19.

We’re excited to announce that several of our expert curators will be available to answer your questions from 10 AM to 3 PM EDT on Twitter using the hashtag “#askacurator”.

Our curators are looking forward to answering your questions, particularly the ones that relate to their areas of expertise. Here are the curators who will be participating:

Nancy Pope, Historian and Curator
Area of expertise: Nancy has worked with the items in this collection since joining the Smithsonian Institution in 1984. In 2011 she curated the museum’s new permanent exhibit Systems at Work that delves into the inside world of US postal operations, answering a common visitor question: “How does my mail get where it’s going?” Nancy can field questions in all areas of postal history, but her particular interests are transportation and technology history.

Daniel Piazza, Curator of Philately
Area of expertise: Daniel collects and writes about the stamps and postal history of the U.S. during the Bureau period (1894-1978) as well as the Italian peninsula. Having co-curated this spring’s Fire & Ice: Hindenburg and Titanic exhibit, Daniel is now working on the William H. Gross Stamp Gallery, slated to open on September 22,2013. He is ready and willing to tackle all of your philatelic (stamp-related) questions.

Lynn Heidelbaugh, Curator of Postal History
Area of expertise: One of Lynn’s favorite subjects is the Dead Letter Office, and she would love to answer questions about what happens to mail that ends up there. Military mail continues to be an area of interest for Lynn, who curated the exhibit Mail Call, which opened at NPM last November.  Lynn is also happy to tackle lots of topics in postal operations, so bring on the questions!

Some tips for participating in Ask a Curator Day:

•    If you’d like to follow the full conversation and see questions and answers between other individuals and museums, use a website such as TweetChat (www.tweetchat.com) to view all tweets that use the hashtag.

If you’re new to Twitter, there are many helpful guides www.mashable.com/what-is-twitter to get you started.

•    One of the things our curators would be happy to talk about is what exactly curators do. What’s your favorite thing about being a curator? What’s a curator’s typical work day like?  What kind of background do you need to become a curator? They can field any and all questions like these.

•    Although they are passionate about their specific subjects and love to discuss them, curators might sometimes hesitate to speculate on questions outside their scope. If you have a question they can’t answer, we’ll do our best to point you in the direction of a resource that may be able to.

•    On the same note, some questions can’t be answered in 140 characters, the limit Twitter puts on tweets. If that’s the case, we’ll explain the issue to you, and you might just see your question inspire a future blog post!

•    The hardest questions to answer are ones that require curators to designate the “oldest,” “biggest,” or “most valuable,” objects. Because more research could always shed new light on a given topic, curators are reluctant to call any object the “tallest” in history, for example. You’ll get a much more useful answer if you ask about an example of an early kind of object, or a curator’s favorite.

•    If you’re not on Twitter, you can always reach the museum through Facebook, commenting on blog posts, or in a variety of other ways: (www.postalmuseum.si.edu/global/s_contactus.html).

Katie Burke is the Arago and social media coordinator on the National Postal Museum’s Web Team. She'll be coordinating the Museum's participation in Ask a Curator Day.

Congressional Stamp Exhibit a BIG success!

By Ian Gibson-Smith, National Postal Museum Council of Philatelists

Over 800 people of all ages attended this year’s Congressional Stamp Exhibit, held July 24-26 at the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C. The vast majority spent a significant amount of time playing with and learning about stamps.  (This figure does not count the large number of people who stopped by the table in the hallway to look at and play with the stamps and the folks who came by in the evening while we were not there, which we estimate was at least an additional 200!)  Eight members of Congress participated, and 15 members came by to see the exhibit. Dr. Wayne Clough, Secretary of the Smithsonian, a member of the UK Parliament and a number of other dignitaries stopped by as well.

Between the displays of material from members of Congress, the National Postal Museum frames, the Stamp Collecting 101 exhibit, the U.S. Postal Service educational display, the Stamps Teach table, StampCampUSA participants and the free stamps, we seemed to have had something that appealed to everyone.

The response was uniformly and overwhelmingly positive and we were asked constantly if we could make this an annual event. We received positive press in the Washington Post, Roll Call and a number of blogs.

The response we received seems to me to validate our belief that the way to win new collectors and reignite the passion of folks who previously collected as children is to simply get stamps back in their hands. We hope this idea can be duplicated and perhaps implemented in other ways--perhaps by setting up “free stamp” tables in malls, libraries and other events or places.

It was a joy to watch peoples’ reactions to the exhibit. They would pop their heads inside, look around the exhibit and then, as they walked by one of the tables of free stamps, idly pick up a stamp or two for a closer look. They would stop strolling and start looking more closely at the stamps.
Once one of our volunteers would talk to them, they would either pull up a chair or would continue to play and stay for a significant amount of time--in many cases for hours! We had attendees who got so excited that they left behind their briefcases or meeting materials. We even had a few folks who missed hearings and work-related obligations entirely due to their excitement over the stamp exhibit. 

This effort could not have happened without the help, kindness, and enthusiasm of many supporters and friends who share a love and passion for philately.

So many individuals and organizations came together to make this event effortless. I have to thank the National Postal Museum and their stellar staff, the kind donation of the Stamp Collecting 101 exhibit by an anonymous donor, the materials and time offered by the American Philatelic Society and their education department, the frames and bags from NAPEX, the stand of materials from the U.S. Postal Service, the extraordinary dedication and energy of StampCampUSA and their volunteers, the National Postal Museum Council of Philatelists volunteers, Members of the House and Senate, the
energy and hard work of Philip LoPicollo from the Smithsonian’s Government Relations Office, Frank Haught, who took a great deal of his personal time to make this a reality, and others.

I had a great deal of fun doing this and look forward to doing it again!

19 Years of the National Postal Museum

By Nancy Pope, Historian and Curator

A museum’s 19th anniversary is not one usually celebrated by big parties full of balloons, cakes, and presents. But it is a nice opportunity to reflect on the past through a blog post.

On July 30, 1993, the National Postal Museum opened, offering at long last an opportunity to share more than just a few objects from the Smithsonian’s philatelic and postal history collections with the public. Over the years the museum has been host to dozens of exhibits, hundreds of public programs and events, and millions of visitors. In the late 1990s we began sharing the world of the postal museum with the even larger audience of the internet, launching our first website.

In the interests of history, I am taking this opportunity to share some images from the earliest days of the museum, when it existed only in our minds and on designer’s pads. In order to help people understand the vision of the museum’s exhibits, designers produced a variety of materials, including a large white scale model of the building and exhibits that each represented our latest thinking as exhibits developed. As you will see, a few designs were realized “as is” but many were tweaked here and there as the creation processes progressed.

Image from the white scale model of the future National Postal Museum shows a relatively accurate version of what would become the museum’s opening exhibits in the atrium “Moving the Mail” area.

Photograph taken from the same spot as the white model image shows the museum’s “Moving the Mail” atrium exhibits as they appeared in 2010.


Image from the scale model of the “Moving the Mail” atrium exhibit area as it was once envisioned. The train made the final cut, the center area that included stacks of mail did not.


A photograph from almost the same angle shows the museum’s atrium exhibits as they looked when the museum opened in 1993.


“Romance vs. Reality,” the museum’s Pony Express exhibit as originally envisioned.


“Romance vs. Reality” as it looks in 2012.


    
Aside from a name change “Philatelic Treasures” became “Philatelic Rarities” the vault door and rarities area looked the same in the design and this 1993 image.


    
While the view of the atrium changed between design and final construction, the entrance to the museum just needed a safety rail between the escalators to match up with the entrance as it looks today.

The Postmaster General Collection

By Annette Shumway, Museum Technician

As a graduate student in Intro to Museums class, it floored me to learn just how many wonderful objects were present in museum collections but were not being exhibited. This prompted me to research and gain experience in digitization of collections. Now as an employee assigned to the Postmaster General Collection, I am thrilled to think of the digitization possibilities for this collection.

What exactly is the Postmaster General Collection?

The Postmaster General Collection (PMG) consists of two distinct collections: the philatelic collection, which contains postage stamps, die proofs, essays and other material related to the printing of stamps and postal stationary; and the art collection, which contains the original artwork that the Postal Service has commissioned for U.S. stamps for the last 75 years.  The philatelic collection was started in the 1860s by the Post Office Department (POD). Under the POD and its successor organization the United States Postal Service (USPS), it has grown to include postal stationary, uncut press sheets, and metal printing dies and drums.

Kate Collen sorting the first portion of the transfer in Summer 2010.

Under an agreement with the USPS, the PMG collection has been deposited on long term loan to the National Postal Museum (NPM). In exchange for the collection, the museum staff is responsible for the care and management of the collection and for making it available to the public. As part of the cataloging process, we will identify and describe each object, being sure to include information such as its dimensions and material types-- and safely store it in containers that will extend its life.

Cataloging the philatelic (stamp and other postal matter) portion of the collection began in summer of 2010. At that time, we were re-housing and cataloging the objects prior to moving them to NPM storage. By the end of 2011, we had over 12,000 objects in the database. According to Smithsonian digitization standards, we could say these objects were digitized to an acceptable standard! Certainly, curators and researchers would now be able to quickly search through these records, sorting on various criteria.

In the fall of 2011, USPS also granted us the loan for the original artwork of many U.S. stamp designs - on the condition that we move it within three months. Wow! Considering that the artwork doubled the amount of objects we would be transferring AND we had not yet finished cataloging the philatelic portion, this was a pretty tall order. But we were up for the challenge.

I, along with my interns, Alexandra Nichols (pictured here, on the left, me on the right, unpacking a framed object) and Janelle Batkin (below, sealing the boxes before the move), worked diligently to sort objects and inventory boxes, unloading boxes that were overly stuffed, and adding cushioning to those that were not completely filled in order to stabilize the contents. And we measured! We measured  everything from the boxes that needed custom lids to the opening in the doorway (needed to make sure those moving boxes fit once they were packed...) to the height of the loading docks of the various locations where the collection would be deposited.

Once at the museum, we opened the moving boxes, carefully checking the contents against our inventory list. Almost immediately there were Curatorial requests for objects from the collection. Having this list was essential to locating the objects within our 30 plus 2’x2’x2’ boxes. We worked through the spring to finish transferring the remaining philatelic objects into their containers. Shortly thereafter the cataloging of these objects resumed.

Next, we turned our attention to the art portion of the collection. Many of the original art objects had been grouped by Scott number (a number that designates the design and printing elements of the stamp or postal stationary).  Because the art was wrapped in bundles of tissue paper and stored inside acid-free cardboard boxes, for the most part it is in good condition. However, some of the bundles were overcrowded and needed to be rehoused. The bundles also did not allow for ready access to the collection. We also saw instances where the bundles had been opened and the contents had been dispersed making it difficult to gather the pertinent objects quickly.

To answer these challenges, we placed the 2-D objects in acid-free folders and boxes, maintaining the Scott number order, but dividing them by size-small, medium, large and extra-large categories. Incredibly, much of the art is smaller than a newspaper page and thus fits into our small or medium categories. Once these objects are recorded in our database, it will take a few clicks of a mouse to gather the object locations, and from there a short while to physically reunite the objects in their original grouping, if the need should arise.

Boxes for housing small, medium, and large objects customize the storage while keeping them to a manageable size for the museum personnel.

Looking to the future, our next phase is to ensure that the breadth and depth of this collection is captured in our database, imaged, and choice objects are loaded into our online collections website, Arago. If you live in the DC Metro area, some of the elements of the collection will be on display in the William H. Gross Gallery that is set to open in fall 2013. But for the rest of us, other portions of this long hidden gem may be coming to a computer near you.