Jun
15

Today in Smithsonian History: June 15, 1904

Groundbreaking, Smithsonian National Museum of natural history

As a crowd of observers looks on, a woman using a spade lifts the first piece of dirt at the groundbreaking of what will become the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. SI employees, Secretary Langley, and architects Joseph Coerten Hornblower and James Rush Marshall all attended the ceremony. (Photographer unknown, 1904)

June 15, 1904 The ground is broken by Smithsonian Secretary Samuel P. Langley for the new United States National Museum building (now the National Museum of Natural History) at Tenth Street, N.W., on the south side of what is now Constitution Avenue.

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Posted: 15 June 2019
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