Descriptive Entry

These records consist of documents deemed to be of historical value by the Office of Facilities Planning and Engineering Services along with photographs, reports correspondence, contracts and blueprints documenting Smithsonian buildings and construction projects. The buildings documented include the Smithsonian Institution Building, the Arts and Industries Building, the Army Medical Museum, the Natural History Building, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the National Zoological Park, the Museum Support Facility at Silver Hill, the Adelaide Forbes Calhoun Property, the Merriwether Post Estate Hillwood, the Renwick Gallery, the Barney Studio House, the Freer Gallery, and the Old Patent Office Building. There is substantial documentation of efforts to provide parking on the mall. Photographs in the collection document a number of activities including the laying of the corner stone for the Natural History Building, the turning of the Joseph Henry statue, the removal of Greenough's statue of George Washington from the Smithsonian Institution Building, the 1970 fire in the American History Building and repairs and renovations of numerous interior spaces throughout the Smithsonian.

Historical Note

The Office of Facilities Planning and Engineering Services was established in 1973. Prior to that it was incorporated in the Buildings Management Department. Andrew F. Michaels directed the office until 1975 when Phillip K. Reiss became director and continued in that office through 1980.