The Met is a great place to begin research and one of the best places to come up with an idea for a project if you don’t have one yet. Not only does it house a huge collection of American art and artifacts from the mid-17th century to the turn of the 20th, but it also has a lot of historical resources about these pieces in its libraries.

The museum’s collection includes everything from the exterior of an early 19th-century Wall Street bank to rooms furnished in the styles of cities along the Eastern seaboard in different periods; from individual pieces of pewter, silver, and glass to clothes, musical instruments, and an astounding collection of American paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, decorative arts, furniture, and photographs. Since the opening of the Henry R. Luce Center for the Study [http://www.metmuseum.org/education/er_lib.asp#hen] of American Art, the American art displayed in the American Wing has become accessible to the public year-round.

The American Collection is one of the few in the museum that you can see in its entirety at any given time. Items on display are grouped by theme or period and arranged to provide interesting and thought-provoking comparisons in style, in period, or between artists. Works by American artists born after 1875 are housed in the Modern Art galleries. There are also American pieces in several galleries around the museum, such as Musical Instruments, Arms and Armor, and Costumes.

Besides the galleries, the Met also has several libraries. The best one for high school students is the Library and Teacher Resource Center in the Uris Center for Education [http://www.metmuseum.org/education/er_lib.asp#hen]. It contains a listing of all of the objects the Met owns, as well as additional material that helps put the object you are looking at into its proper historical context. Nearly all of the museum’s American art is described in volumes written by the curators. You can also look at teaching materials. While you can’t take any materials home with you, you can photocopy them for a minimal fee. Also in the library are bulletins that the Museum puts out five times a year highlighting its acquisitions and related news. This library is open to you. In fact, it even caters to students, especially those in junior high and high school. Best of all, the library is free.

Before visiting the Metropolitan you may want to check out its website www.metmuserum.organd the Timeline of Art History www.metmuseum.org/toah. Both sites will give you an idea of what the collection has, where you can find it, as well as an idea of the topics you can explore here. Both sites may be searched by topic, artist, title of a work, time period, culture, theme, or geography.

You should also look into the museum’s classes [http://www.metmuseum.org/events/ev_student.asp]. They run on a trimester schedule in the fall, summer, and spring. They’re free but do require pre-registration. E-mail students@metmuseum.org for class offerings and registration. Ranging from beginner to advanced levels, they cover everything from conversation about art and art history to drawing and painting. Also, you are welcome to attend any of the concerts, workshops, or lectures that are advertised to adults. You may need to pre-register. Like the classes, these are free. Both the classes and workshops are excellent ways to narrow down general interests to a more specific focus suitable for a paper. Once you begin to look at individual pieces in the collection, be sure to note their accession numbers and look them up in the Luce Center computers, for information on the objects and the artists who created them.

Of particular note is the Met’s collection of paintings by Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, and several Hudson River School painters. It includes several paintings by Thomas Cole, as well as The Heart of the Andes by Frederic Edwin Church and The Rocky Mountains, Lander’s Peak by Albert Bierstadt. Also in the collection are Thomas Hovenden’s The Last Moments of John Brown, Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of Washington (the image of him that has since been used on the one-dollar bill), and Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze—all on view in the American Wing.

A simple list of names cannot convey the emotional impact of these works. Washington Crossing the Delaware is especially evocative. Housed in a room with many other seminal works by other painters, Leutze’s masterpiece overshadows them all due to its sheer size and its stirring portrayal. The nearly life-sized Washington stands in the prow of his boat, a veritable pillar of fortitude. The icebergs, rendered in exquisite detail, seem as sharp and menacing today as they must have appeared to the soldiers in that boat so long ago. Sitting before this painting, one cannot help but feel the pride and patriotism of those men on that day.

Other permanent American holdings of the museum [http://www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/department.asp?dep=2] include architectural works by Louis Comfort Tiffany and Frank Lloyd Wright. A clear contrast can be seen between Wright’s 1914 designs and the furniture of Colonial New England from 1650, and you’d be amazed how interesting it might be to write a paper that contrasts the two.

For more information about the museum, you can contact anyone in the department of School, Teachers, Family, and Library Programs at (212) 570-3961. Alice Schwarz has volunteered her name as someone who would be more than willing to help you navigate your way through the museum.