Behind the Scenes: Revolution in Their Words

Installation is underway for the DAR Museum’s America 250! special exhibition, Revolution in Their Words. Drawing on diaries, letters, and documents from the NSDAR’s Americana Collection, the exhibit features firsthand accounts of the Revolutionary War, many of which have never been publicly displayed.

The exhibition is arranged thematically into four sections: Words of Diplomacy, Words of the People, Words of Resistance, and Words in Print. Each section features museum objects staged in vignettes to set the scene. In Words of Diplomacy, for instance, a tavern scene evokes a common setting for political discourse of the period. John Hancock’s letterbox, signed and dated 1770, sits prominently on the table. The letterbox and other items associated with Hancock were donated to the Museum in 1970 by NSDAR member Henrietta Niles Ward Howe, a descendant of John Hancock’s nephew (also named John Hancock). Vignettes in the other sections include a writing table similar to the one used by poet Phillis Wheatley, a typical soldier’s camp scene, and a printing press.

Designers, fabricators, and mount makers are hard at work preparing materials for the exhibition. The exhibition furniture, graphics, and other built-in features set the stage for the objects, the stars of the show!

Before the stars are ready for the spotlight, some had to undergo conservation for stabilization and appearance. One such document is the 1819 copy of Philadelphia printer John Binns’ “splendid edition” of the Declaration of Independence. Binns was not the first to reprint the Declaration of Independence, but his was by far the most ornate, with decorative medallions surrounding the United States arms. The Binns copy of the Declaration of Independence was donated to the NSDAR Americana collection by Rosalind Barton in 2016 and its conservation by Morgan Browing of the Washington Conservation Studio was generously sponsored by the DAR’s America 250! Committee.