180 Years Of Curiosity: How One Englishman’s Fortune Built America’s Smithsonian
Source: Silicon Bay Partners’ Staff with assistance from ChatGPT
Photo: The Smithsonian Institution Building in Washington, D.C., also known as “The Castle”. (Wikipedia)
James Smithson never set foot in America. Yet 180 years after Congress accepted his extraordinary gift, his name is attached to one of the world’s greatest collections of knowledge.
There are plenty of ways to leave your mark on history. You can become president. You can win a war. You can write a famous book. You can invent something that changes the world.
Or, if you’re British scientist James Smithson, you can die thousands of miles away, leave your fortune to a country you’ve never visited, and accidentally create one of the most extraordinary institutions on Earth.
On August 10, 1846, President James K. Polk signed legislation establishing the Smithsonian Institution. That makes 2026 the Smithsonian’s 180th anniversary—180 years since an unusual bequest, years of congressional arguments and one rather remarkable act of generosity transformed the intellectual and cultural landscape of the United States.
And perhaps the strangest part of the story is that Smithson never actually visited the United States.
The Englishman Who Bet on America
James Smithson was an English chemist and mineralogist who died in 1829. He was the illegitimate son of a wealthy Englishman and spent his life studying science at a time when scientific discovery was becoming an increasingly important force in understanding the world.
Smithson’s will contained a remarkable provision.
His estate would initially go to his nephew, Henry James Hungerford. But Smithson specified that if Hungerford died without an heir, the entire estate would go to the United States of America to establish an institution in Washington dedicated to what he called:
“the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.”
Hungerford died without an heir in 1835. And suddenly the United States had a very unusual problem:
What do you do when a British scientist you’ve never met leaves you his fortune? The answer, as it turned out, was: Argue about it for eight years.
Congress Gets Its Hands on the Money
The United States formally accepted Smithson’s bequest in 1836. The money arrived in America in 1838, amounting to more than 100,000 gold sovereigns and, after conversion, more than $500,000—an enormous sum at the time.
Congress then proceeded to debate what exactly America should do with it. And there were plenty of suggestions.
Should the money create a university?
A library?
An astronomical observatory?
A scientific research laboratory?
A museum?
Congress apparently discovered that agreeing on what to do with free money can be almost as difficult as agreeing on how to spend your own.
After years of sometimes heated debate, lawmakers finally settled on an institution that could encompass science, education, research and the arts. On August 10, 1846, the Senate approved the legislation by a vote of 26 to 13, and President Polk signed it into law the same day.
The Smithsonian was officially born.
A Mission That Still Sounds Remarkably Good
The language in Smithson’s bequest has survived for nearly two centuries:
“The increase and diffusion of knowledge.”
It’s hard to imagine a more straightforward mission. Learn things. Discover things. Preserve things. Then share what you’ve learned with everyone else. And that’s precisely what the Smithsonian eventually became.
The original legislation envisioned a building holding collections of natural history, a chemical laboratory, a library, an art gallery and lecture rooms. It also called for the institution to receive objects of art and natural history belonging to the United States and copies of copyrighted publications.
In other words, Congress essentially told the Smithsonian:
Go collect America’s stuff—and then figure out what it means. It turned out to be a pretty good idea.
From One Building to a National Treasure
The first Smithsonian building, now famously known as the “Castle,” was completed in the 1850s. The institution grew from there. And grew. And grew some more.
Today, the Smithsonian describes itself as the world’s largest museum, education and research complex, encompassing 21 museums and galleries, 14 education and research centers and the National Zoo. Its collections contain more than 157 million objects and specimens, along with millions of library volumes and an enormous archive of historical material.
Think about that for a moment. One man’s fortune eventually helped create an institution responsible for preserving millions upon millions of pieces of human history and the natural world.
And most Americans can walk into its museums without paying admission.