AMST 205 Project Three

Greenbelt Museum Website Exhibit

Your final project is to construct an exhibit for Virtual Greenbelt. Virtual Greenbelt is a Web site based on the Greenbelt Museum in Greenbelt, Maryland. It was begun by the AMST 205 class in the fall of 1995 and has been added to by students in two other courses as well as faculty and graduate students in the American Studies Department. Excellent projects from this class will be added to the permanent collection.

Our theme this term has been Where Americans Sleep, and you are encouraged to base your exhibit on the sleeping spaces in the Greenbelt Museum. You are expected to apply the field analysis techniques and the computer skills learned during the semester to present your conclusions in a formal manner.


Your exhibit may be either artifact centered or theme centered. You may choose an artifact or group of artifacts and use the Fleming model to write labels for your exhibit. Or, you may choose a theme and choose artifacts in the museum and elsewhere to illustrate your exhibit.

You are expected to use primary documents to provide information about your artifacts and to support your themes. The Tugwell Room in the Greenbelt Public Library has a wide variety of material about Greenbelt, including copies of local newspapers, photographs, and books. The Maryland Room at the McKeldin Library on campus may also provide useful materials. Magazines and area newspapers of the period 1937-1945 can also provide important information. Sears Roebuck catalogs are another useful source. Don't forget the readings that have been assigned this term as secondary sources for your work.

Please note, you may find some material available on the Internet through collector's web sites or company sites. But do not rely entirely on the Internet for the documentation of your project. See the Resources page for information about citing web sites.

You can also interview family members or community residents who can tell you about the use of artifacts during the period 1937-1945. Be sure to document your exhibit with footnotes that cite your sources.

There are transcripts of oral interviews with Greenbelt residents, magazine articles, and books on Greenbelt on reserve in the American Studies Department Office. You will be asked to leave your student ID or drivers license with the department secretary when you borrow the material.

This may be an individual or a team effort. You may form curatorial teams of two or three people, but we will then expect your exhibit to reflect the work of several people, either in more breadth or more depth than the exhibit of an individual. Curatorial teams may choose to receive the grade of the project, or members may choose to receive individual grades based upon each person's contribution.

The First Draft of your exhibit is due on Monday, December 3 by class time. Please make every effort to have a substantial portion of your exhibit done at this time. We will discuss each project and you will have the opportunity to revise and re-work your exhibit based on comments and suggestions that you receive in class.

The Final version of your exhibit is due on Tuesday, December 10. It should include two links to other student projects. Be sure to footnote your sources.