Winter's best bets for celebrating your heritage and reliving history.
Food on the Table
What do your family's food traditions say about you? Find out at the Smithsonian Institution's traveling exhibit
Key Ingredients: America by Food, coming to the Tooele Pioneer Museum in Tooele, Utah,
through Jan. 24; the Vermilion County Museum in Danville, Ill.,
Jan. 9-Feb. 20; and the Utah Cultural Celebration Center in West Valley City, Utah,
Jan. 31-March 20. Through artifacts, photographs and illustrations, Key Ingredients examines the historical, regional and social traditions in America's dining rooms. You'll learn how ethnicity, social class and landscape have influenced the foods you and your ancestors have eaten. Key Ingredients is part of the Museum on Main Street, an initiative to bring Smithsonian exhibits and educational programs to rural areas, and to spotlight local museums' collections. For a complete tour schedule through 2008, visit the Key Ingredients interactive Web site at <
www.keyingredfents.org>.
St. Louis, Mo.: Road to Rediscovery
Two hundred years ago, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark set out from St. Louis on what would become the most famous cross-country road trip in American history. Under the instructions of President Thomas Jefferson, the duo traveled up the Missouri River to explore the newly acquired Louisiana Territory, On their way, they collected plant, mineral and animal specimens; mapped the continent's interior; and blazed relationships with American Indians. Now, you can follow the Corps of Discovery's epic expedition through the Missouri Historical Society's Lewis & Clark: The National Bicentennial Exhibition, Jan. 14-Sept. 6 at the Missouri History Museum. The exhibit captures their transcontinental journey with more than 600 relics, including the letter of credit from Jefferson to Lewis, American Indian artifacts given to Lewis and Clark, plant specimens, the explorers' personal items and more. For details, call (800) 916-8212 or visit <www.lewisandclarkexhibit.org>. And if you can't make it to St. Louis, the exhibit also will travel to Philadelphia, Denver, Portland, Ore., and Washington, DC, through September 2006. For more on visiting St. Louis, see page 58.