Washington

When you are businessman and philanthropist William Wilson Corcoran, you have a few heavy-hitters in your rolodex, including Millard Fillmore, Jefferson Davis, Baron Alexander von Humboldt, and Daniel Webster. Corcoran rubbed elbows with the well-heeled and well-connected, and was a catalyst for culture and education in Washington D.C. with the building of the Corcoran Gallery of Art and numerous donations to universities.

In 1972, the Smithsonian's National Zoological Park welcomed its first pair of giant pandas, Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing, as a gift to President and Mrs. Nixon. The second and current pair, Mei Xiang and Tian Tian, arrived in 2000 as part of the Chinese giant panda loan program. For over 40 years, the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute (NZP/SCBI) has been a leader in giant panda conservation through the study of behavior, health, and reproduction.

This beautiful book of pressed flowers was compiled by newlyweds Ralph L. and Hetty G. Dixon, who collected the majority of the specimens along the banks of the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Towpath in Georgetown in the 1920s. Although the Dixons were amateurs, they took great care in the mounting and identification of their blooms, and it is thanks to this that most of the specimens remain intact. But the love story contained within these pages isn’t the only golden thing about the book; the locally collected flowers include golden corydalis and golden ragwort.

Biologist Ernest Everett Just (1883-1941) is considered to be one of the most brilliant African American scientists of his era.  Born in Charleston, SC, he earned scholarships to attend northern schools, graduating top of his class at Dartmouth. He taught at Howard University where he became head of the new zoology department. He also studied fertilization in marine invertebrates at the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratories and eventually earned his Ph.D. in experimental embryology at the University of Chicago in 1916.

Published five years after his death, the editor of Autobiography of W. E. B. Du Bois incorporated selected works related to certain passages’ subjects. William Edward Burghardt Du Bois (1868-1963) was an African American author and civil rights activist who focused on advancing education and representation for African Americans. The last of his three autobiographies, this work expanded on his previous essays to provide a new reflective perspective on his 9 decades of life.

This wonderful book is about the history of the famous Japanese flowering cherry trees in Washington, D.C. It’s co-authored by Roland Jefferson, the first African American botanist  at the U.S. National Arboretum (USNA), hired in 1956.  Mr. Jefferson began his career studying crabapple trees, but eventually became an international authority on flowering cherries, making many plant collecting trips to Japan.

"Music is my mistress, and she plays second fiddle to no one." Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington is an American jazz legend – a talented pianist, a composer of over 1,000 songs, and a bandleader who gained national attention through his orchestra’s appearances at the famed Cotton Club in Harlem. In this book, Ellington tells the stories of his life and career. He describes growing up in Washington, D.C. in the early 1900s, when he dreamed of playing baseball, not the piano. He shares photographs of his beloved parents and other family members and friends who influenced him.

Described by the Literary World Magazine of 1880 as a “superb holiday volume” and printed on toned paper with a gold deckle edge, this volume is illustrated with engravings of many well-known, and not so well-known, American homes. Not surprisingly, it features a detailed description of the White House, as well as an image of the presidential mansion as the book’s frontispiece. The homes of some Founding Fathers are also highlighted, as are homes of writers like Emerson, Longfellow, and Washington Irving.