In a brightly lit gallery, they see the 66m-year-old skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex. In a darkened room, they study the flag that inspired Francis Scott Key to write the national anthem. In a vast aviation hangar, they behold a space shuttle. And in a discreet corner, they file solemnly past the casket of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Black boy lynched for allegedly whistling at a white woman in the US south.
Visitors have come in their millions to the Smithsonian Institution, the world’s biggest museum, education and research complex, in Washington for the past 178 years. On Thursday, Donald Trump arrived with his cultural wrecking ball.
