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New museum on African-American history opens

US Congressman John Lewis, who pushed for years for the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, spoke at its opening Saturday.ZACH GIBSON/AFP/Getty Images

WASHINGTON — In a speech filled with reminders of America’s dark and not-so-distant past, and hopes for a brighter future, President Barack Obama helped to inaugurate the National Museum of African American History and Culture Saturday in Washington.

The country’s first African American chief executive stood before a crowd of more than 7,000 official guests — and thousands more gathered on the National Mall — and repeated the words of poet Langston Hughes: ‘‘I, too, am America.’’

‘‘African American history is not somehow separate than the American story. It is not the underside of the American story. It is central to the American story,’’ Obama said.

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Behind him, the 400,000 square-foot museum stood as a testament to that notion. Serving as home to more than 36,000 artifacts, the museum exists to both memorialize and educate, sharing the ‘‘unvarnished truth’’ of America’s past and celebrating the triumphs of its present.

‘‘It helps us better understand the lives, yes, of the president, but also the slave, the industrialist but also the porter, the keeper of the status quo but also the activist seeking to overthrow that status quo, the teacher or the cook alongside the statesmen,’’ Obama continued. ‘‘By knowing this other story we better understand ourselves and each other.’’

This long-awaited moment is being heralded by a weekend of celebrations across the city, in what the museum director Lonnie Bunch has called a ‘‘mini inauguration.’’ The most anticipated event was the opening ceremony, which included speeches from Oprah Winfrey, Will Smith, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and former president George W. Bush, who signed the 2003 bill that authorized the museum.

Bush called the finished product ‘‘fabulous,’’ saying: ‘‘It shows our commitment to truth. A great nation does not hide its history. It faces its flaws and corrects them.’’

He gave credit to Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who spent 15 years fighting in Congress to make the museum a reality. When he took the stage Saturday, Lewis had to take long pauses to contain his emotion.

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Giselle Shapiro of Los Angeles held her hands in prayer on the Washington Monument grounds during the opening of the African American history museum.Cliff Owen/Associated Press

‘‘There were some who said it couldn’t happen, who said ‘you can’t do it,’ but we did it,’’ said Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., who led the charge to make the museum a reality. ‘‘This place is more than a building. It is a dream come true.’’

The building itself is striking: its bronze-hued exterior and unusual shape stand starkly in contrast with the buildings surrounding it, and purposefully so . Inside, visitors walk the path from slavery to civil rights to the Black Lives Matter movement, and everything in between. The familiar and the untold stories of history are shared through meaningful objects: from the shawl of Harriet Tubman to a candy-red Cadillac driven by Chuck Berry, to the uneven-bar grips used by Gabby Douglas in the 2012 Olympics.

For the time being, getting inside the museum will take some planning. Although, as with all Smithsonian museums, entry is free, admission currently requires a timed ticket, available at nmaahc.si.edu/visit/passes . All the tickets for opening weekend were snapped up the moment they were made available in August. Tickets for September, October, November and every weekend in December are sold out. But starting Monday, individuals can obtain up to four same-day passes from the visitor services staff starting at 9:15 a.m.

Even without a ticket, there’s still good reason to head to the Mall this weekend, if you don’t mind crowds and security checkpoints . On the Washington Monument grounds between 15th and 17th streets NW, the museum is hosting a free, three-day festival celebrating African American culture. Food stands will offer Southern barbecue, Kenyan curries, Caribbean jerk and Gulf Coast po’ boys. Music, poetry, dancing and storytelling will entertain visitors throughout the day, leading to a Saturday night concert featuring Living Colour, Public Enemy and the Roots. The festival will continue on Sunday.

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People were already streaming onto the grounds of the Washington Monument before sunrise Saturday, hoping to get a view of the festivities - or at least see them on the Jumbotrons nearby.

‘‘We are very excited to see our family history,’’ said Gladys Atkins, from Helmetta, N.J."We of course descended from slaves. . . I have photographs of my slave ancestors.’’

She and her husband have tickets to enter the museum for 5:30 p.m. In fact, they have tickets for four separate days.

‘‘We are serious,’’ she said.

President Obama spoke at the museum.JIM LO SCALZO/European PressPhoto Agency

Attendees looking up at the Mall’s newest landmark wondered aloud what its existence means to the conversation about race in America. The opening ceremony comes at the end of a week when two deadly police shootings - of Keith Lamont Scott in Charlotte, N.C. and Terence Crutcher in Tulsa, Okla. - became the latest catalysts for ongoing protests about the way black men are treated by law enforcement.

‘‘I can only hope that this [museum] does provide an opportunity for greater healing,’’ said Atiba Muse, a political organizer from Petersburg, Va. who sat among other donors at the ceremony. ‘‘We’re in need of triage. This is the initial steps to resuscitate.’’

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Others were overwhelmed thinking of how far the black community has come. Beulah Stowe Cary, 92, sat outside the ceremony in a motorized wheelchair, telling the story of her childhood. She was born in North Carolina in 1924, but remained in the state for just three weeks before her family sent her to relatives in Virginia. She had a white mother and a black father; they feared that a biracial baby wouldn’t be safe in the South.

David Hudson, a volunteer from Silver Spring, recalled being chased out of a restaurant in South Carolina because he was black. He was 8 years old at the time.

Now, at 63, he’s passing out programs at the foot of a building meant to ensure his country will never forget how boys like him were treated.

‘‘To see all of our story and history from the very beginning, from the shackles,’’ reflected poet Sonia Sanchez before the ceremony began. ‘‘From how we were enslaved and how we have become president, and how we have come writers in this country and professors. . .We are a part of this great American landscape and you are going to remember us. You’re going to remember us when you come to this museum.’’