>On Sat, 23 Jul 1994, Ann Mintz wrote:
>
>> To add another layer of information to Dave Wells' comment about the two
>> facilities at NMAI.  Plans actually call for three buildings: the Customs
>> House, the Mall Museum, plus the storage/study facility at (sp?) Suitland
>> Maryland outside Washington D.C.  I participated in a two-day planning
>> meeting for NMAI a couple of years ago, and they also discussed what they
>> call the Fourth Museum, which a museum without walls on the grandest possible
>> scale, a virtual assemblage of hundreds of tribal nations linked by
>> technology.  In some ways, they felt that the Fourth Museum was the most
>> important.
>
I have worked as a consultant with NMAI for a number of years as the
strategies have developed. The participation of Native Americans is a
fundamental goal of the effort and the Fourth Museum has been a theoretical
goal that will take advantage of technology as it develops. Computer
coordination for the entire NMAI is being organized. The NY Customs House
is the first of the three facilities to open and the Maryland storage is
adjacent to the other Smithsonian facilities. Maryland is being designed by
Native American architects as is the Mall location (John Paul Jones). The
first museum of the 21st century and the last on the Mall.
Paul Apodaca