by Jared Grigsby

Washington's newest museum, the Newseum, answers the question "What is news?" by examining and displaying journalism of the past and present.

The Newseum opened April 11, 2008, on the last remaining open site on Pennsylvania Avenue, across from the West Wing of the National Gallery of Art and between the U.S. Capitol and the White House. With six levels of exhibitions, from early news to a gallery of Sept. 11, 2001, front pages to an ethics center, the Newseum provides 14 galleries and 15 theaters to engage its visitors.

According to a Newseum visitor representative, the Newseum receives 550 newspapers every day, so it's possible to find a favorite publication.

Some Newseum exhibits, like the Pulitzer Prize Winning Photographs Gallery, may be too intense for some children and visitors. Despite the gasps escaping from the mouths of those slowly walking past the exhibit's walls of photographs, visitors are able to connect with the photographers' subjects and share common emotions. Heidi Atlas, a Newseum visitor from Chicago, Ill., wondered about the photographers.

"What must have been going through these photographers' minds as they were standing there, taking these pictures as these events were happening?" Atlas said.

The 9/11 gallery on the fourth floor of the Newseum stops visitors in their tracks, as a wall of front page headlines from newspapers from around the U.S. and the world repeats a lot of the same images but with distinctly different headlines.

"I think the biggest contrasting ones are the San Francisco Examiner and the Wall Street Journal," Mandi Rice, a NLGJA Student Project member from Earlham College, said. "The Examiner wrote 'Bastards,' which I can't justify journalistically, while the Journal, in its stodginess, didn't even run a photo."

The quote, "Journalism is the first draft of history," by Philip Graham, a former co-owner of The Washington Post, is engraved on a wall in the News History exhibit on the fifth floor. Publications from all periods of time are encased and presented. Frank Lin, another NLGJA Student Project member from the University of Chicago, received chills from seeing Graham's quote come to life.

"The idea that journalism is the first draft of news, walking past these [news articles of the past], people don't know how integral journalists are," Lin said. "Journalists are living it and able to grasp the magnitude of an event so quick after it's happened."

A steady flow of visitors continues to keep the Newseum staff busy since its opening. According to Newseum visitor representatives there are a lot of groups, schools and other organizations visiting the museum. The Newseum is open seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., except on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day. Admission for adults 13 to 64 is $20, seniors 65 and older are $18, youth ages 7 to 12 is $13 and children 6 and younger are free.



Slideshow photos by Jared Grigsby