Contest Winners, and I, Enjoy a Real Night at the Museum

Recently I was involved in a “first” in my career here at the National Air and Space Museum – a sleepover! About six winners (and their families) in the Post Cereal Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian contest spent the night in the National Mall building on Friday, August 7. The lucky slumber-partygoers had competed in an online sweepstakes that was promoted on Post cereal boxes. Post employees who had worked on the project also attended with their families. The guests came from all over the country, and ages ranged from two to adult.  I was their overnight hostess. The group received a tour of the Museum; an out-of-this-world sky lecture; a viewing of the Planetarium show, Black Holes; a paper airplane contest; and a duct tape wallet activity. At 11 p.m., guests changed into their "jammies" and settled in for a viewing of the first Night at the Museum movie in the Earth Today Theater. By 1:30 a.m., it was finally bedtime.  Guests slept in sleeping bags on cots in the Beyond the Limits gallery, and I slept on an inflatable mattress in my office. Before departing Saturday, the group enjoyed some Post cereal and then headed back into their tour bus to take in more sites around town. Afterward, we received no reports of artifacts coming to life during the night, although the space monkey, Able, appeared to be smiling the next morning. The major motion picture, Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, was filmed on location at the Smithsonian Institution.  Some of the story takes place inside the National Air and Space Museum and features many of the objects currently on display. Don’t miss your chance to see the movie on location! Showing, Fridays and Saturdays through October 1, at the National Air and Space Museum's Lockheed Martin IMAX Theater.