Smithsonian articles from November 1990

Smithsonian archives from November 1990

Smithsonian horizons. (biological research) (column)
November 1, 1990... Smithsonian horizons Anyone who tries to keep abreast of current developments in science, even if only as unavailingly as I do, cannot help being aware of the extraordinary range and fertility of developments in modern biology. The dominant...

Around the Mall and beyond. (two films: 'Dances with Wolves' and 'Blue Planet') (column)
November 1, 1990... Around the Mall and beyond It's movietime! Two blockbuster films are about to open, both with strong Smithsonian connections. First, chronologically, is Dances With Wolves. The title becomes clear about halfway through this powerful,...

Phenomena, comment and notes. (fossil-collecting in the badlands) (column)
November 1, 1990... Phenomena, comment and notes Your first fossil, like your first kiss, is something you never forget. My first (fossil, that is) came in the sun-drenched badlands of northwestern Wyoming about five years ago. I had just come down off a ridge...

'You survive because everyone cares, everyone has walked in your shoes.' (Arthur County, Nebraska)
November 1, 1990... 'You survive because everyone cares, everyone has walked in your shoes' "See that dip between the hills?" Margaret Hawkins asks, pointing to a saddle-shaped depression in the low, hummocky knolls on her cattle ranch in Arthur County, Nebraska....

An extraordinary look at the frontier that's long gone. (turn-of-the-century photographs of eastern Montana) (illustration)
November 1, 1990... An extraordinary look at the frontier that's long gone "The great hunting days are over in Custer County and the ranchman and granger will see to it that they never return. About all that is left to the sportswoman today is to hunt with the...

In Renaissance Venice, Titian was prince of painters. (National Gallery of Art exhibition)
November 1, 1990... In Renaissance Venice, Titian was prince of painters This is how, on a good day, they order things in La Bella Italia. When an exhibition of the works of Titian opened in Venice this past spring the entire nation rejoiced. The opening was...

New machines are smaller than a hair, and do real work. (silicon machinery)
November 1, 1990... New machines are smaller than a hair, and do real work Richard Moroney, a 25-year-old graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, is trying to build a microscopic electric motor, known in the engineering world as a "micromotor."...

Coral reef fishes use riotous colors to communicate. (illustration)
November 1, 1990... Coral reef fishes use riotous colors to communicate Coral reef fishes play games with our eyes, attracting attention here and diverting it there. As they lurk in the shadows or wheel amid the towers of the reef, their skin perform tricks with...

For the King's English, fighting the good fight. (writer and grammarian H.W. Fowler)
November 1, 1990... For the King's English, fighting the good fight For the best part of a century, H. W. Fowler has been supreme lawgiver for English usage, guiding neophyte and faithful to a writer's paradise in which errors dissolve and every sentence scans....

A scheme to harness India's sacred waters brings tempers to a boil. (dam being built on the Narmada River)
November 1, 1990... A scheme to harness India's sacred waters brings tempers to a boil Jagannath Prajapathi sat cross-legged on the concrete slab he calls his bed, half-hiding the stumps of the toes that were taken by leprosy in the years before the river cured him....

'High and Low': modern art meets popular culture. (various artists; Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York; 20th century popular arts)
November 1, 1990... 'High and Low': modern art meets popular culture Latrine duty is dirty work, but in the army somebody has to do it. The buck private, howeveR, was determined it would be someone else. He had talents for higher things, things the Army could use:...

The playwright and his 'Mollissima,' in pursuit of love. (George Bernard Shaw and Molly Tompkins)
November 1, 1990... The playwright and his 'Mollissima,' in pursuit of love "The true artist will let his wife starve, his children go barefoot, his mother drudge for his living at seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art. To women he is half vivisector,...

A curiosity turned into the first silver bullet against death. (penicillin used on the first patient, Anne Miller)
November 1, 1990... A curiosity turned into the first silver bullet against death She had been gravely ill for nearly a month when the package arrived. Anne Miller, now a vigorous 82-year-old grandmother, remembers only dimly the fight to save her life half a...

I'm all suited up, and a fireman for life. (establishing a volunteer fire department) (column)
November 1, 1990... I'm all suited up, and a fireman for life I am a first-grade schoolteacher, a small-sized woman, not very brave. I have no mechanical sense, loud noises make me jump and I'm afraid of heights. Why, then, was my hand raised when they called for...

Dances with Wolves.
November 1, 1990... Dances With Wolves Dances With Wolves premiered last month in Washington, D.C. to benefit the Smithsonian's newly planned National Museum of the American Indian and the Smithsonian Resident Associate Program. It opens in eight cities on...

Blue Planet.
November 1, 1990... Blue Planet Next: Blue Planet. It's the new Imax film, soon to fill that huge screen at the National Air and Space Museum's Samuel P. Langley Theater, thanks to the Smithsonian, the Lockheed Corporation and the cooperation of NASA. It's...

Cowboys of the Americas.
November 1, 1990... Cowboys of the Americas "I see by your outfit that you are a cowboy." so go the words of the well-known song "The Cowboy's Lament." But whose cowboy? What country's? For the sake of historical accuracy, only a closer look at the cowboy's...

Disappearing Through the Skylight: Culture and Technology in the Twentieth Century.
November 1, 1990... Disappearing Through the Skylight O.B. Hardison, University Professor of English at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., knew a great deal about the disappearance of many familiar ideas, philosophies and objects that have made up our...

As Thousands Cheer: The Life of Irving Berlin.
November 1, 1990... As Thousands Cheer The songwriter as celebrity--it's a phenomenon difficult to imagine in this era of performer-worship. (Who besides devotees knew, say, the name Carole King until that veteran composer of rock hits made a smashing album,...