Riches, Rivals and Radicals: 100 Years of Museums in America

Riches, Rivals and Radicals: 100 Years of Museums in America is a television odyssey filled with commanding and charismatic characters whose fervor fueled the 20th-century revolution that changed America's museums from dusty and elitist to dynamic and democratic!

“But they were dusty,” says Marjorie Schwarzer, Chair of Museum Studies at John F. Kennedy University in Berkeley, California, and author of the companion book, published by the American Association of Museums. “They were filthy places. And it was a really large problem. There were no ventilation systems. People smoked. People chewed tobacco and spit on the floor. They were called stuffy because they were stuffy. But the 20th century is a new story.”

Riches, Rivals and Radicals 100 Years of Museums in America By Marjorie Schwarzer; American Association of Museums $39.95 $6.95 shipping and handling To purchase, call 1-877-AAM-3034 (1-877-226-3034) or click here.

Featured are interviews with key figures in 20th-century museum history including David Rockefeller, whose parents created Colonial Williamsburg in Virginia and the Museum of Modern Art in New York in the 1920s; Margaret Burroughs, founder of the first African American Museum in the country in Chicago; Michael Spock (son of Dr. Benjamin Spock), former executive director of the Boston Children’s Museum and a leader in the children’s museum movement of the 1960s.

The one-our special is hosted by the award-winning national correspondent Susan Stamberg, a member of the Broadcasting Hall of Fame; special correspondent for National Public Radio; and popular host of public radio and television programs.

Riches, Rivals and Radicals: 100 Years of Museums in America shows that the museum world does not lack heroes and visionaries: Franklin Delano Roosevelt believed that museums were part of the very “warp and woof” of democracy. His Works Progress Administration employment program engaged artists -- such as Jackson Pollock and Jacob Lawrence, who worked in museums. John Cotton Dana, founder of New Jersey’s Newark Museum created integrated art classes and apprenticeship programs for young women seeking museum careers. He exhibited factory objects as works of art to increase awareness of the contributions of immigrant factory workers. Julius Rosenwald, founder of Sears & Roebuck also founded the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. Frank Oppenheimer, the nuclear physicist, founded San Francisco’s Exploratorium in 1969.

The Museum of Modern Art: In Our Time (New York)

What do the super stars of modern art -- Van Gogh, Matisse, Picasso, Pollock, Warhol -- have in common with the Vincent Black Shadow motorcycle and an Apple iPod? All share the stage at New York¹s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Here the two big questions are: What makes it modern AND what makes it art? MoMA¹s scholars along with David Rockefeller (son of MoMA founder Abby Rockefeller) prove that the modern art of any age is not the newest; it¹s the next.

National Baseball Hall of Fame: Home Base (Cooperstown, NY)

Since the first five men elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1936 -- Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson – the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown has become one of the nation's most recognizable and popular educational institutions.

Baseball and America have grown up together, through immigration and industrialization to integration and technology. This special explores the richness of baseball as the American pastime and, like the game itself, appeals to people of different ages and across all cultural heritages, fostering a new appreciation not only of baseball, but of our national character. The program also examines how the American landscape, our language, literature, movies, and summertime living all bear the mark of a 19th-century game that continues to be identified with our nation's values and aspirations.

Walker Art Center: Creative Catalyst (Minneapolis, MN)

This special explores Walker Art Center, a place where everything comes together—where paint meets pixels and performance art. Interviews with museum scholars, choreographer/dancer Bill T. Jones and artist Chuck Close reveal the important international role the Walker plays as a creative catalyst for artistic development in painting and sculpture, performing arts, film and art education. Formally established in 1879, the Walker Art Center began as the first public art gallery in the Upper Midwest. The new Walker opened in 2005, with a suite of new galleries, a refurbished cinema, a state-of-the-art theater, and restaurants and shop. It's the place where art meets life.

Boston Children’s Museum: Mind Over Matter (Boston, MA)

This program features the second oldest children’s museum in America, founded in 1913. The Boston Children's Museum began a "hands-on" tradition long before that phrase became commonplace. _A special interview with Michael Spock (museum director 1962-85) gives insight to his role in revolutionizing the traditional museum experience, getting objects out of cases and into children's hands in exhibit areas where children could interact, experiment, and follow their own curiosity.