Politics & the Museum of the American Indian: The Heye & the Mighty

The following narrative can be regarded as an ethnography. I recorded data encompassing a thirteen-year period (1977-1990) as a participant-observer while serving as Director (and then Director and President) of the Museum of the American Indian-Heye Foundation (MAI). The account chronicles the trials and tribulations of the transition of that Museum to a new status as part of the Smithsonian Institution, the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI). The saga of the MAI is significant; it needed to be told. It is meaningful to record the circumstances surrounding the rescue of the Heye Collection and the transition of the MAI into the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI).