What-To-Do Wednesday - Virtual Visit: The National Women's History Museum

If you want to get your dose of culture while being stuck inside, many museums and other attractions offer a variety of virtual exhibits. This is an especially great time to explore museums and attractions that are outside of your area and maybe even outside of your country that you ordinarily would not be able to get to because of time and/or money constraints. We will doing so as well and  we will be sharing one or more of our virtual visits in today's and future What-To-Do Wednesday posts.

What: The National Women's History Museum

Where: 205 S. Whiting Street
             Suite 254
             Alexandria, VA

The National Women's Museum is located in Alexandria and is devoted to telling the stories of women who transformed the nation. The Museum offers quite a wide variety of online exhibits including the following:

Women in the Olympics - This exhibits gives you an overview of the history of women's participation in the Olympic games. Learn about tennis player, Helen Wills and  and Multi Sport Athlete, Babe Didrickson Zaharias, relive Mary Lou Retton's gold medal winning vaults in gymnastics and the US teams winning the first gold medals in soccer and ice hockey and more.


Inventive Women - This exhibit focuses on women inventor's from 1865 to 1900. Learn about Charlotte Smith who fought for women's right including women's right to own the rights to their own inventions. Other women inventors covered in the exhibit include Sara E. Goode who invented a folding cabinet bed, Margaret Knight whose numerous inventions included the machine that folded and glued flat bottomed paper bags found in grocery stores, and Josephine Cochrane who invented the dishwasher.

Timeline World War I - This exhibits focuses on women's contributions during the first World War I. The exhibit highllights groups like the Hello Girls,  telephone operators who were also the focus of an Off Broadway Musical called The Hello Girls; the International Congress of Women, who were dedicated to peace and devoted to ending the war; and The National League for Women's Service, whose job it was to coordinate the women's war efforts. It also mentions individual women like Mary Roberts Rinehart, the first journalist to reach the front during the war; Loretta Perfectus Walsh, the first women to enlist in a branch of the armed services; and Elsie Janis, a singer, songwriter and actress who performed for the troops.

Other exhibits include ones on First Ladies, The Woman of Nasa, Sojourner Truth and more.

For more information or to begin exploring the National Women's History Museum's virtual exhibits yourself, visit www.womenshistory.org/womens-history/online-exhibits.

And that's our view. Tune in tomorrow for Theater Thursday.

Stay home, stay safe, stay healthy!

Photo credits:
photo credit 1: Patrick Hoesly 577 - Olympic Rings Texture via photopin (license)
photo credit 2: Production photo from Hello Girls the Musical by Richard Termine