Washington, D.C.’s Newseum in May introduced a provocative new exhibit, Reporting Vietnam, marking the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War. The exhibit explores the dramatic stories of how journalists brought news about the war to a divided nation. Reporting Vietnam will be on display through Sept. 12, 2016.
Included in the exhibit are more than 100 dramatic images, including memorable Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs that have come to symbolize the struggle both in Vietnam and at home. There is also news footage, evocative music and more than 90 compelling artifacts, historic newspapers and magazines. An interactive kiosk in the exhibit features interviews with Pulitzer Prize-winning photographers who took some of the most iconic images of the war.
Set to a soundtrack of protest songs, the exhibit opens with an exploration of the culture clash that emerged in the 1960s as seen through mainstream and counterculture publications of the day. Reporting Vietnam challenges perceptions that linger 50 years after U.S. troops arrived in Vietnam, and poses the question, did the press lose the war?
“The Vietnam War polarized the nation and led Americans to question the legitimacy of authority everywhere,” says Peter Prichard, chairman and CEO of Newseum. “The exhibit captures the essence of a complex moment in American history, transporting visitors back to a time when peace, love and understanding were the goal, but not always the reality.”
As part of the exhibit, the museum’s Robert H. and Clarice Smith Big Screen Theater features Reporting Vietnam: Eyewitness to War, an original documentary that tells the story of press coverage in Vietnam through archival video, photographs and interviews with journalists who covered the war. Two other original films explore the protest movement at home and how television forever changed the way Americans receive news from the battlefield.
Contributing support for the exhibit is provided by CBS Corporation in memory of the award-winning CBS News and 60 Minutes correspondent Bob Simon, whose legendary war reporting over five decades began in Vietnam. He died in a car accident in February 2015.