The Newseum

Our next stop on this blistering hot day was to the Newseum. This was one of Jon's favorite museums while he lived there and Preston had been hoping to go all summer, but hadn't had a chance to. So we took a gander on over.

On the front of the building you can see the words from the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech , or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

It is a huge building, but if you look down by where all the people are walking, you can see newspapers displayed. They have a copy of each state's main newspaper for that day. It's pretty neat!

There are several exhibits throughout the museum.

One of my favorites was that of the Berlin Wall. We saw a piece of the Berlin Wall at the American History museum, but just nearby this wall was...

one of the original guard towers that were used to guard anyone from crossing the wall.

They also had an entire display on the media's attempt to try to cover Hurricane Katrina. Hurricane Katrina hit on August 29, 2005 and was the most destructive hurricane in Amercian history. It put 80 percent of New Orleans under water and left more than 1,800 people dead, displaced more than 1 million people, and destroyed billions of dollars worth of property and jobs.

These are the front pages of two of the major newspapers in Mississipi from August 29 on. The newspapers became a "beacon of hope" for readers in the hope that some had survived.

Katrina was such a dramatic part of media history because it was somewhat a baptism by fire experience for many reporters. Suddenly they were thrown into an event where people's lives depended on their display of their tragic state.

I love the ABC that was done back in August 2010. If you are interested in watching it, you can view it here.

A replica of an original printing press.

Inside this exhibit, they had the front page of newspapers after several historic events took place in history.

This was the spire from one of the World Trade Center towers. They had front pages of newspapers from all over the world in response to the attack on the United States. Some a little more explicit than others. They also had cameras that were found after the towers had fallen from a photographer who had been killed. The film had some of the most startling pictures, many of which you see each time you look back to 9/11.

They had Pulitzer Prize winner photographs there. This was a my favorite part of the whole museum. They had all of these photos displayed and next to each photo had the story given about the situation of the photo. Some were joyous, some were momentous, and some were downright devastating. However, when someone says that a picture is worth a thousand words, I would say a Pulitzer Prize photograph is worth several thousand.

They had each Photo of the Year from years past.

Also an exhibit on the President's photographer, who is with him during every major moment during his presidency.

And then they had an interesting display that took me by surprise. It was a wall filled with pictures of reporters who had died in there struggle to report certain events. I guess you could say "in combat," but that isn't usually what you think of when you think of the media's role. However, that was exactly what they meant. These people risked their lives to bring about truth.

I loved the Newseum!