The National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) Opens Its Doors

The Smithsonian’s new National Museum of African American History and Culture  (NMAAHC) located on the National Mall in Washington D.C., opened to the public on September 24th with a gala unveiling which attracted thousands of visitors eager to check out the museums’s stunning collection of, at times, heartbreaking yet ultimately uplifting, artifacts and historical objects that detail “a people’s journey and a nation’s story” as NMAAHC’s tagline reads. “I planned to go for two hours, and I was there for four hours just trying to cover the basement part,” Deryl McKissack, CEO and Chairwoman of McKissack & McKissack, the project management firm oversaw all aspects of the NMAAHCs construction. told a reporter for the Washington Business Journal about her visit on opening day. “What really came across and hit me hard was how much of an economic boost the slave trade gave the United States,” said McKissack, herself the great great-grandaughter of a former slave. “My ancestors were right in there, working for nothing for generations.”