What Smithsonian historians are picking from the 2024 Democratic National Convention
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Three curators of political history from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History are headed to Chicago and the 2024 Democratic National Convention soon to collect material—or as experts call it, ephemera: eeverything from balloons to tickets to clothing. The Smithsonian’s collection of political campaigns includes items ranging from George Washington.
The conversation political editor Naomi Schalit spoke with Claire Jerry, Jon Grinspan, and Lisa Kathleen Graddy about what conservatives are getting at the Republican National Convention in July and what they hope to hold in Chicago. All of those things will be added to the collection in an effort, as Grinspan explains, “to make sense of our moment for people who wonder what we were all thinking.”
And if you are wondering how the keeper brings the balloons home from the meeting, he pierces a small hole near the knot with a sharp needle pin from the campaign button he collected, shrinks it and packs it.
Naomi Schalit: Claire Jerry and Jon Grinspan, when we last spoke, the Republican National Convention had just ended, and you were both rushing to the airport to head home. Little did you know what you were going to get.
Claire Jerry: That is still true. We are starting to get email responses to the business cards we have given out, but nothing has come in yet.
Jon Grinspan: We have started working with the staff of the meeting itself. They sent us a bunch of stuff—signs, access badges, structure, all kinds of stuff from the meeting, visual stuff, stuff from logistics, and planning. That kind of thing is consistent with the things we have in collections from previous meetings.
Shalit: So when you say it rhymes, that refers to the saying “history doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” I think what these articles can do is give you a record, about these things, of how things change over the years in convention planning?
Jerry: Yes. Things like stadium maps and things like that are new, but we’ve always gotten convention tickets from different conferences, and those change over time. So some of them are things that conventions have always used, and some of them are new things that exist each time.
Shalit: How were this year’s tickets different?
Grinspan: The tickets for the meeting this year were showing patriotism. There are many flags, fighter planes, eagles. They really depend on that theme.
Jerry: And they are also plastic. Our tickets are the oldest, most secure, and designed to look just like any other ticket. Although these tickets, most of them are designed to be included in the sources.
Shalit: I understand you were there for the traditional balloon drop at the end of the meeting. How was it?
Jerry: It’s amazing how quickly it blurs your vision. I was on the convention floor at the time, and I had a very clear view of the stage, where I was watching Donald Trump speak. Suddenly you don’t see the stage. You won’t see the candidates with their families up there on the stage because there are a lot of balloons.
Then you watch people—myself included—trying to pick up balloons from the ground, and you think you have one, and it bounces off someone else’s foot, and you feel like you’re down on someone’s knees trying to catch something from the ground. It sounded strange, but it’s a wonderful celebration and it’s fun and I think that the presence of children, on the platform and in the audience, gave a real sense of family, which is not something I could have said at the time. the normal business part of the meeting.
Shalit: You thought, I have a history major, and I’m on my hands and knees picking up balloons from people’s feet to take back to the Smithsonian?
Jerry: Actually, I was. I thought I put my hand on one, and it jumped, and I was very close, in fact, to grabbing someone’s ankle. I was a little embarrassed. I didn’t have an assignment in graduate school that said, “Now we’re going to practice taking balloons from a balloon drop.”
Grinspan: In 2016, I bumped into a prominent Republican politician trying to get on the ground in the middle of a balloon drop. He was very polite. It’s funny, this thing where you have an advanced degree in history or research, you read accounts of meetings from 1860 or whatever, and then sometimes you try to go up and catch balloons or try to see how you can carry them. home all the things you collect. There is a real body, a tangible aspect of this history, and it is our duty to hold on to it.
Schalit: So all three of you are going to the Democratic convention in a few days. Lisa Kathleen, what are you thinking as you plan that trip?
Lisa Kathleen Graddy: I’m curious to see how the language used in recent meetings is reflected in material culture. Will that be reflected in the signs? Does that come from the buttons? Will that be reflected in the chyron that will run around the stadium?
Is there anything to say, “Mind your own damn business”? Will anyone say, “We’re not going back”?
Who knows if they still print anything, what can be recycled that was previously planned. And both parties always do something when they honor the outgoing president. So all of a sudden they have to do Joe things, “thank you, Joe” things. So will some of that be there that wasn’t there before?
It will be interesting to see what Minnesota comes up with as a team.
Schalit: Hot food hats from Tim Walz’s region?
Graddy: Oh God, I would love to see a hot bowl hat. There will be hot dishes, please.
Claire Jerry is curator of political history at the Smithsonian Institution.
Jon Grinspan is curator of political history at the Smithsonian Institution.
Lisa Kathleen Graddy is curator of political history at the Smithsonian Institution.
This article has been republished from The conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the first article.
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