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Smithsonian Stories: Chronicle of a Golden Age, 1964-1984, by Wilton S. Dillon
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Why is the Smithsonian more than the “Nation’s Attic?” Or more than a museum complex? As Wilton S. Dillon shows, the Smithsonian came to be the institution we know today under the twenty-year leadership of “Sun King” S. Dillon Ripley.
Ripley aspired to reinvent the Smithsonian as a great university—with museums. Although little understood by the public at large, it began as a basic research center. The Smithsonian remains a key contributor to the world of higher learning and functions diplomatically as the ministry of culture for the United States. Dillon provides backstage insights into Ripley’s quest for the wholeness of knowledge. He describes how he inspired its role as a “theater of ideas as well as artifacts.” Under his tutelage, the National Mall became a playground for world intelligentsia, an “intellectual free trade zone” in the shadow of the nation’s political capital.
Dillon reminds us that interdisciplinary, international Smithsonian symposia foreshadowed twenty-first-century issues and trends. His descriptions of the educational rewards of balancing tradition with the avant-garde are inspiring. As Dillon reminds us, Ripley’s twenty-year reign may well have helped spark the waning embers of the Enlightenment.
- Sales Rank: #1845955 in Books
- Published on: 2015-01-05
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.80" h x 1.00" w x 5.90" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 408 pages
Review
“Who would have thought that the British scientist James Smithson's odd bequest would blossom into one of our Republic's greatest treasures, the nation's attic, the Smithsonian Institution? It has fallen to Wilton Dillon to chronicle its golden age from 1964 to 1984—and he does it magnificently. A wonderful story plucked from that invaluable attic.”
—Ken Burns, filmmaker
“Smithsonian Stories is a riveting story that throws a spotlight on a little noticed key part of American cultural history.”
—Edward O. Wilson, Harvard University
“Wilton Dillon provides this much-needed, erudite, and enjoyable backstage account of the legendary Dillon Ripley’s exciting ‘golden age’ at the Smithsonian. These stories illustrate Ripley’s quest: rediscovery of the wholeness of knowledge. He shared that quest with my husband, Arthur, to which end they both urged partnerships of scientists, artists, and humanists. The founding of the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery (the National Museum of Asian Art) brought a vital new extension of the Smithsonian’s coverage of global cultures, one of many far-sighted initiatives of the Ripley era.”
—Dame Jillian Sackler, philanthropist
“Wilton Dillon has starred discreetly in an extraordinarily long extraordinary career at the very center of American intellectual public life. He tells the story in a memoir of Mozartean elegance of phrase and captivatingly warm wryness. A joy to read, it even generated genuine tense excitement about planning international symposia at the Smithsonian. Oh, and always use loose tea when entertaining foreign visitors at 4 o’clock.”
—Lionel Tiger, Rutgers University
“What can one say of such a glittering scope of accomplishments, breadth of fields, sensitivity to the institution’s mission, insights to such a variety of disciplines, the collecting of so large a number of thinkers who defined the 20th century and provided to them a forum for their vision? An awesome panorama that epitomizes the profound meaning of ‘increase and diffusion of knowledge.’”
—Paul Perrot, Smithsonian; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
"Wilton Dillon's memoir of his activities and exploits at the Smithsonian give a unique and absorbing insight into this landmark institution. By sheer force of his generous personality and his professional curiosity,Wilton was able to attract an extraordinary array of intellectuals from all over the world to participate in the symposia and conferences that he organised at the Smithsonian. These meetings, tackling a variety of subjects and issues, have become part of contemporary history. With his remarkable memory, Wilton has been able to recreate the exciting debates that took place at the Smithsonian under his aegis. The Smithsonian memoirs deserve to be read by anyone who is interested in gaining a greater understanding of the issues that swirled around the second half of the 20th century. The Smithsonian should be proud that one of its stalwarts has provided this challenging feast."
—Hella Pick, former Diplomatic Editor and Washington Bureau Chief of the Guardian (newspaper)
"This is a moving, at times inspiring story of a young American Werther, provincial by birth but metropolitan by aspiration, propelled by chance into the center of American cultural and intellectual life, who rose to become one of Washington’s most accomplished impresarios of ideas. The book is a paean to the power of words, to the joys of discovery, and to the life of the mind. It is also largely a tribute to the values of education, hard work, and respect for knowledge that Americans have treasured, and—thanks to the Smithsonian bequest—need never forget. Above all, Wilton Dillon’s prose is a play on the importance of play, even amidst the intensity of introspection. His life story is one of which Goethe himself might have been proud.”
—Roy MacLeod, University of Sydney
“Wilton Dillon’s Smithsonian Stories scores on several fronts. The book covers the history of our national museum complex during a great era. It contains a wonderful series of vignettes connecting things and exhibitions to the issues of our day, and the cultures of past and present. It shows why many of us love museums, and why that love is germane to integrating the arts, sciences, humanities, and technology. The stories are also fun.”
—John R. Rowe, Exelon Corporation; The Field Museum
“Anthropologist, chronicler, and raconteur extraordinaire, Wilton Dillon paints a lively portrait of life in the Tower during two decades of unprecedented expansion. The list of scholars, artists, and statesmen whom the Smithsonian engaged in its activities—as an unparalleled center for research and guardian of our nation’s cultural heritage—is an impressive one. In this charming and exceptionally detailed account, Dillon tells us something about them all.”
—Pauline Yu, American Council of Learned Societies
“I am very glad that these stories are out, for the record, because they reflect an insider's view of a time at the Smithsonian that sparkled with creativity and mischief of the good sort. Dillon Ripley (like Wilton) was restive under authority, the antithesis of "the man in the grey flannel suit." He used his tenure as Secretary of the Smithsonian to be outrageously unpredictable and inventive. He was a perfect match for the spirit of eccentric British nobleman, James Smithson, who willed his fortune to the newly independent United States for the establishment of an institution devoted to "the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men." Ripley worked against the grain of political and business conventions to carve out a campus of cosmopolitan culture, play and experimentation at the heart of Washington, DC. As a theater aficionado he knew the importance of a stage presence and of ritual, and went all out in that direction. With glee. I particularly like his idea that the nation's capital needed (needs) a Museum of Man -- an ethnographic museum-- operating from its own building, not as part of the museum of Natural History, and wanted Wilton to be in charge of the project. The Italian architect Pier Luigi Nervi's design for a new Pitt-Rivers Museum in Oxford (1960's, never executed) was the model. Alas, that was one battle Ripley did not win. I hope Wilton's book rekindles interest in the Ripley years, a Camelot period in American culture and museum history.”
—Edgardo C. Krebs, Research Associate, Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution
About the Author
Wilton S. Dillon is former president of the Institute for Intercultural Studies (founded by Margaret Mead) at the American Museum of Natural History in New York and senior scholar emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution. His four Smithsonian decades drew upon earlier experience as a soldier, journalist, college teacher, foundation executive, and science diplomat. He is a graduate of University of California, Berkeley, and holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University. Additionally, he was honored by the French government with the Chevalier des arts et des lettres, in part, for his book Gifts and Nations.
Robert D. Sullivan has over forty years of museum experience. From 1990–2006, he served as the associate director for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.
Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful.
Five Stars
By Bob Vail
Great read. Very interesting.
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