The Newseum was an American museum dedicated to news, journalism, and the five freedoms protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Founded by publisher Al Neuharth and operated by the Freedom Forum, it was based in Rosslyn, Virginia, from 1997 to 2002 and at 555 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., from 2008 to 2019. Through historical artifacts, interactive exhibits and multimedia displays, the museum traced the development of news media from early printing to broadcasting and digital journalism.
The Washington museum occupied seven levels and of exhibition space. At its opening, it contained 14 galleries, 15 theaters, two broadcast studios and more than 130 interactive stations. Major exhibits covered the Berlin Wall, the September 11 attacks, the history of news, Pulitzer Prize-winning photography, the First Amendment, press freedom around the world and the development of radio, television and the Internet. The Today's Front Pages Gallery displayed up to 80 U.S. and international newspaper front pages each day.
After years of financial losses, the Freedom Forum agreed in 2019 to sell the Pennsylvania Avenue property to Johns Hopkins University for $372.5 million. The museum closed on December 31, 2019. The former museum building was renovated and reopened in 2023 as the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center. The Newseum's monumental First Amendment tablet was installed at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, while the Freedom Forum retained custody of the museum's permanent collection.
History
The Freedom Forum was founded in 1991 by publisher Al Neuharth, founder of USA Today, and grew out of the Frank E. Gannett Newspaper Foundation. On April 18, 1997, it opened the first Newseum in Rosslyn. The museum attracted 2.25 million visitors during its five years there. Jerry W. Friedheim, the first executive director of the Newseum, devised its name.
By 2000, Freedom Forum leaders had concluded that the Rosslyn museum had outgrown its location and was too far from Washington's main tourist areas to draw many walk-in visitors. The organization decided to relocate the Newseum across the Potomac River to Washington, D.C. The Rosslyn museum closed in March 2002 while plans proceeded for a substantially larger facility.
The Freedom Forum acquired a site at Pennsylvania Avenue and Sixth Street NW from the District of Columbia for $100 million. Polshek Partnership Architects, led by James Stewart Polshek, was selected to design the building, while Ralph Appelbaum Associates, which had designed the exhibitions at the Rosslyn museum, was responsible for the exhibition design. The design was unveiled in October 2002. The Pennsylvania Avenue site was chosen in part for its symbolic location near federal buildings and the cultural institutions of the National Mall.
The Washington facility was originally scheduled to open in October 2007, but construction delays and additional time required to install and test its electronic systems postponed the opening. The Newseum reopened to the public on April 11, 2008. Its new home provided approximately three times as much exhibition space as the Rosslyn museum. It operated on Pennsylvania Avenue until its closure on December 31, 2019.
Building and design
The Newseum occupied approximately of exhibition space across seven levels within a mixed-use development designed by Polshek Partnership Architects. It contained 14 galleries, 15 theaters and two broadcast studios. A atrium formed the center of the building, and visitors followed a route of approximately through the museum. Leslie E. Robertson Associates served as structural engineer for the building and its exhibits.
The design consisted of three layered volumes parallel to Pennsylvania Avenue, rising progressively in height; the architects likened the layers to pages of a newspaper. The Pennsylvania Avenue façade was predominantly glass, intended to symbolize the openness of the press and democracy. Beside the entrance stood a , 50-ton tablet of Tennessee marble engraved with the 45 words of the First Amendment.
A large rectangular opening in the façade, described by Polshek as a "window on the world", allowed passersby on Pennsylvania Avenue to see visitors circulating through the atrium and glimpses of the large media screen inside. Visitor areas were also arranged to provide views toward the Capitol and the National Mall.
In addition to museum space, the development contained offices for the Freedom Forum, 136 rental apartments and The Source, a restaurant operated by Wolfgang Puck. One of the museum's broadcast studios housed ABC's This Week from 2008 to 2013 and was subsequently used by Al Jazeera America for its Washington bureau.
Exhibitions The Newseum combined historical artifacts with films, digital displays, theaters and interactive exhibits. When the Washington museum opened in 2008, it contained 14 galleries, 15 theaters and more than 130 interactive stations. Its more than 6,200 artifacts included objects associated with major events in the history of journalism and news media. In addition to its permanent displays, the museum presented changing and traveling exhibitions throughout its years in Washington.
Permanent galleries and displays
The New York Times–Ochs-Sulzberger Family Great Hall occupied the museum's central atrium. A high-definition screen presented news and material related to the museum's mission, while electronic news displays carried continuously updated headlines. A replica communications satellite and a Bell 206 news helicopter were suspended above the hall.
The Today's Front Pages Gallery presented a changing selection of newspaper front pages from around the world. By 2019, the Newseum received more than 800 front pages electronically each day and enlarged 80 for display; the selection included newspapers from across the United States and other countries. Selected front pages were also displayed in cases outside the Pennsylvania Avenue entrance. The project continued online after the museum's closure under the Freedom Forum.
The News Corporation News History Gallery was the museum's largest permanent gallery and covered more than 500 years of news history. Its central timeline displayed nearly 400 historic newspaper front pages, newsbooks and magazines, while interactive displays gave access to digitized publications and information about journalists. Other displays examined subjects including war reporting, sensationalism, media credibility and journalistic objectivity. Items displayed included a 1603 English broadsheet reporting the coronation of James I, a 1787 issue of the Maryland Gazette containing the proposed United States Constitution, an 1860 extra edition of The Charleston Mercury announcing the dissolution of the Union, and the erroneous 1948 Chicago Daily Tribune front page proclaiming "Dewey Defeats Truman".
The 9/11 Gallery examined news coverage of the September 11 attacks through artifacts, photographs, newspaper front pages and accounts from journalists who covered the attacks. Its principal artifacts included the upper section of the broadcast antenna from the World Trade Center's North Tower and a piece of fuselage from United Airlines Flight 93. The gallery also commemorated photojournalist Bill Biggart, the only journalist killed while covering the attacks, and displayed his cameras, press credentials and personal effects. The antenna stood against a display of newspaper front pages published after the attacks.
The Berlin Wall Gallery contained eight intact sections of the Berlin Wall, together forming the largest display of unaltered sections of the wall outside Germany, and a three-story East German BT-9 observation tower that had stood near Checkpoint Charlie. The exhibit examined the role of news and information in the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The Pulitzer Prize Photographs Gallery displayed photographs from every Pulitzer Prize-winning photography entry since the first photography prize was awarded in 1942. Interactive displays provided access to more than 1,000 photographs and approximately 15 hours of interviews with prize-winning photographers. Among the photographs exhibited were Joe Rosenthal's Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, images from the Vietnam War and photographs documenting other major news events.
The Cox Enterprises First Amendment Gallery examined the five freedoms protected by the First Amendment—religion, speech, press, assembly and petition—and placed their development and interpretation in historical context. The Pulliam Family History of Liberty Gallery connected news with American political history. Its "1776 — Breaking News: Independence" display included one of 19 known copies of the July 6, 1776 issue of The Pennsylvania Evening Post, the first newspaper to publish the Declaration of Independence.
Several galleries examined the production and distribution of news. The Bloomberg Internet, TV and Radio Gallery traced the development of electronic media through a timeline containing more than 70 radio and television news clips. Two media walls, each high, presented notable events in broadcast history, while other displays examined changing communications technology and broadcaster Edward R. Murrow. The NBC News Interactive Newsroom allowed visitors to prepare a simulated newspaper front page or deliver a television report from a teleprompter.
The museum also displayed the CONUS 1 Satellite Truck, developed in 1984 by Hubbard Broadcasting and CONUS Communications. The Newseum described it as the world's first satellite newsgathering vehicle, allowing local television stations to transmit live reports from around the country without relying on their television networks.
The Time Warner World News Gallery examined journalism outside the United States and restrictions on freedom of the press. A map, updated annually, compared levels of press freedom around the world, while the "Dateline: Danger" display addressed threats faced by journalists working in conflict zones or under repressive governments. The gallery also displayed the laptop computer and passport of The Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, who was kidnapped and killed while reporting in Pakistan. The Bancroft Family Ethics Center used an Ethics Table and interactive kiosks to present visitors with real-life reporting and media-ethics dilemmas.
In a special alcove on Level 4, the museum displayed the bomb-damaged 1976 Datsun 710 belonging to The Arizona Republic investigative reporter Don Bolles, who died from injuries sustained when a bomb exploded beneath his car in Phoenix in 1976.
Journalists Memorial The Journalists Memorial commemorated reporters, editors, photographers and broadcasters who died while reporting the news. The original memorial was dedicated at Freedom Park in Arlington, Virginia, in 1996; a new two-story glass memorial was created for the Washington Newseum in 2008. It was updated annually, and by 2019 bore the names of 2,344 journalists. The accompanying gallery displayed photographs of hundreds of those commemorated and provided searchable information about each person through electronic kiosks.
Beneath the memorial were trace remains of photojournalists Larry Burrows, Henri Huet, Kent Potter and Keisaburo Shimamoto, who were killed when their helicopter was shot down over Laos in 1971; after the Newseum closed, the remains were returned to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.