BOSTON AREA CALENDAR OF EVENTS
The Envoy Hotel Nearby Activities & Entertainment
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The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum today announces the opening of a special display highlighting the White House state dinner honoring Ivory Coast President Félix Houphouët-Boigny, hosted by President and Mrs. Kennedy on May 22, 1962. The Ivory Coast was one of 15 African countries that became independent during the summer and fall of 1960. The exhibit opens to the public on Friday, April 27 and will run through April 2019.
President Kennedy was a strong supporter of African nationalism and independence on both moral and strategic grounds. Within the context of the Cold War, he believed that the newly independent nations could have an impact on the struggle between the western democracies and the Soviet bloc. He also believed that the African movements for freedom and independence were inspired by the same universal aspirations that engendered our own American revolution. The Ivory Coast was one of the most staunchly anti-communist countries among the newly independent African states and was unfailingly loyal to the West. “If we extend the hand of friendship,” JFK said, “then the course of African revolution… will be towards democracy and freedom and not towards communism.” President Kennedy’s invitation to President Houphouët-Boigny was a gesture of friendship to the leader of an emerging African democracy.
Included in the display are:
- Dinner menu with President Kennedy’s notes scribbled as he prepared his toast remarks;
- Silver-spangled evening gown worn by Jacqueline Kennedy to the state dinner, designed by Oleg Cassini;
- Table setting used at the State Dinner;
- Ebony Magazine, featuring a cover photograph of the American and Ivorian First Ladies;
- Program for “Billy the Kid,” performed by the American Ballet Theatre in the East Room following dinner;
- Letter from Aaron Copland, composer of “Billy the Kid,” accepting the invitation to the State Dinner; and
- Seating chart from the dinner.
From the sweet little farm at the foot of Penn’s Hill to the gentleman’s country estate at Peace field, Adams National Historical Park is the story of “heroes, statesman, philosophers … and learned women” whose ideas and actions helped to transform thirteen disparate colonies into one united nation.
Begin your Adams experience at the park Visitor Center, located at 1250 Hancock Street, Quincy, MA, and view the orientation film, Enduring Legacy: Four Generations of the Adams Family, a 26 minute film introducing the remarkable Adams family. Browse the park bookstore for even more information and a variety of souvenirs to remind you of your visit to this historical park and the contributions of four generations of the Adams family to the history and development of the United States.
Visiting the Historic Homes, April 19 – November 10:
The historic homes are open for tours from April 19 through November 10. During this time the park is open seven days a week from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Access to the historic homes is by conducted tours only. Tours last approximately two hours and depart regularly from the Visitor Center located at 1250 Hancock Street. Please be aware that the last tour leaves at 3:15 p.m. daily. We do not accept reservations for tours, and tickets are sold on a first come first served basis. Expect heavier park visitation on weekends and holidays.
Explore the complex history of crocodilians in the Museum’s newest temporary exhibition, Crocs: Ancient Predators in a Modern World. Get up close and personal with this infamous group of reptiles that has fascinated humanity across generations.
Crocs have flourished for more than 200 million years, and the once-diverse group included fascinating creatures like galloping land predators, pug-nosed herbivores, and fully aquatic dolphin-like hunters. All modern crocodilians, however, are built for life at the water’s edge. These stealthy predators have rugged bodies, keen senses, and incredible strength. But they also lead intricate social lives, communicating croc-to-croc with sounds and body posture. They battle over territories, engage in lengthy courtship rituals, and provide their young with tender parental care.
Living crocodilians range from tiny forest dwellers to behemoths that eat wildebeests, buffaloes, and occasionally, people. In a human-dominated world, their future depends on our willingness to share space with these primal animals. Experience the world of crocodilians in this revealing exhibition with cutting-edge science, live animals, and interactive components that demonstrate why it’s important to preserve these elegant predators.
Visitors will see impressive mounted specimens of African wildlife collected over a century ago, including hippopotamus, lion, ostrich, hyena, gorilla, and a variety of rare animals from the island of Madagascar, as well as an interactive video display about endangered species.
Bohemian Beauty: The Aesthetic Movement and Oscar Wilde’s Newport celebrates the ideas embodied by the artists, poets and thinkers popular during the Aesthetic Movement (1870-1890), an important era of artistic experimentation here and abroad. The exhibition will feature a selection of furniture, ceramics, wallpaper, glass, silver, paintings and costume illuminating the tenets of this “art for art’s sake” movement personified by its most influential impresario Oscar Wilde.
This renovated gallery displays thousands of rare minerals and sparkling gemstones in both rough and cut examples, including a 1,600-pound amethyst geode from Brazil. Exhibits highlight new research and offer a broad overview of the dynamic processes and events that formed our planet and that have shaped its continuing evolution. Visitors can touch rock and mineral specimens that date back to the beginning of our solar system. Uncover mysteries of our planet’s origins revealed in ancient meteorites and terrestrial rock containing some of the oldest minerals on Earth, zircon crystals that have survived intact for 4.3 billion years!
Meet a Park Ranger over coffee or your favorite beverage! Ask questions and discuss some of the many exciting offerings and stories connected with the National Parks of Boston! These meetings take place every morning from 9:00 to 9:20 AM throughout July and August at Decca (Building 10) in the Charlestown Navy Yard. For more information visit https://www.nps.gov/bost/index.htm
Come check out the new fur seals exhibit at the New England Aquarium! The Aquarium is just one of three aquariums in the United States that is home to northern fur seals, so get yourself tickets and come on over to see these super furry, long-flippered, happy-splashing friends.
Click here to read more about the fur seals.
Click here to buy New England Aquarium tickets online today.
This exhibition is the first solo museum presentation of the paintings of New York–based artist Caitlin Keogh (b. 1982, Anchorage, Alaska). Keogh’s work explores questions of gender and representation, articulations of personal style, and the construction of artistic identity. Her vivid, seductive paintings combine the graphic lines of hand-drawn commercial illustration with the bold matte colors of the applied arts to reimagine fragments of female bodies, natural motifs, pattern, and ornamentation. Drawing from clothing design, illustration, and interior decoration as much as art history, Keogh’s large-scale canvases dissect elements of representations of femininity with considerable wit, pointing to the underlying conditions of the production of images of women.
