B. B. Gets His Own Museum
Winter 2009 | Volume 58, Issue 6
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EIGHTY-THREE-YEAR-OLD B. B. King figures that he traveled some 60,000 miles behind a mule in the Mississippi Delta before an appearance on a West Memphis radio program in 1948 caused his career as a blues musician to take off Indianola, Mississippi, the location of his last plantation job at a cotton gin, now honors the international star and multiple Grammy Awards winner with his own museum, the 20,000-square-foot B. B. King Museum and Interpretive Center. The state-of-the-art facility, carved out of an old brick gin mill, features interactive computers, video screens, and artifacts that illustrate King’s childhood and life in the Delta.
American Heritage is proud to host the
National Portal to
Historic Collections
Recently added:
- American Revolution Center
- National Museum of Civil War Medicine
- National Museum of the U.S. Navy
- Manassas National Battlefield
- Maryland State House
In association with the
American Association for State and Local History
Why do we need a national nonprofit membership society for American history?
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“Save America’s Treasures” has been totally eliminated—the largest Federal program supporting preservation of such treasures as the original Star Spangled Banner and George Washington’s tent.
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65% of Americans don’t know what happened at the Constitutional Convention, according to a recent survey by Newsweek.
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The “Teaching American History” grants—the largest Federal program supporting history education—have been completely eliminated.
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Visits to the Top 20 Civil War battlefields have dropped in half from 1970 to 2009 according to official National Park Service statistics.
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40% of Americans can’t identify whom we fought in World War II, according to a recent survey by Newsweek.
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A quarter of Americans believe Congress shares power over U.S. foreign policy with the United Nations, according to a recent Annenberg survey.
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“There is little that is more important for an American citizen to know than the history and traditions of his country,” John F. Kennedy wrote in American Heritage.
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The “We the People Program,” which touched some 30 million students and 90,000 teachers over 25 years, has been completely eliminated.
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Two-thirds of Americans could not correctly name Yorktown as the last major military action of the American Revolution, according to a recent national Gallup survey.
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The National Heritage Areas and Scenic Byways program, the only major Federal program encouraging visits to historic places, has been completely eliminated in Congressional committee.
