Smithsonian Kite Festival

Q: Thank you for meeting with us Barbara.

A: You're quite welcome. It's nice to have you here.

Q: So what exactly is the history and the background of the kite festival here at the Smithsonian?

A: This is our 44th year. We've been here for quite a long time, every Spring; and the kite festival is sponsored by the Smithsonian Associates, my office, and the National Air and Space Museum.

And it was started those 44 years ago by Paul Garber, who was one of the early folks at the Air and Space Museum and a real pioneer of flight. And I think he recognized that kites are just terrific because it's a very family oriented activity. Kites can teach us about science, about history, there have been kites used in historical events back in the Civil War to follow troop movements and that sort of thing. So art and science and history. And it's really good, it gets people outdoors and it's fun to go fly a kite.

Q: How did you come up with the theme this year, so what is the theme and how did you come up with the idea?

A: The theme is "hand craft" many of the kites, in fact all of the kites that are competing today have been made by hand; none of them are commercially made and that's very important to us. But because it's such and activity and we have craft tents here where kids can make kites out of found materials and it's a good way to show people, it's recycling, and it's also a good way to be crafty to figure out how to make a kite.

Q: And innovative.

A: And innovative. And you'll find here today, a lot of kites are very unusual shapes and sizes made out of all kinds [of materials], I just saw one made out of newspaper that was braided together, which was kind of unusual.

Q: Do people come from all over the world to come fly their kites here at this festival?

A: They do. I'm not sure what countries are represented this year, but we've had folks from Europe, and we've had folks from the Caribbean. In the last couple of years, we've had master kite makers from Japan and China. We have folks from Jamaica or the Caribbean with us today and they always have a booth and help kids to make kites.

So it really is international. I think the whole kite movement… I was talking with a woman from China who said people were flying kites in China 6,000 years ago, so we're not quite that old with the kite tradition in the United States, but I think it is something that's universal and they have international kite festivals all over the world.

Our kite festival is one of the oldest and largest in the United States.

Q: Now you have different contests and competitions; can you explain what they are and how they have to enter?

A: Well, people just bring their kites and enter. We give them a number and we take pictures of the kites, because we have one award called "People's Choice" and folks get to vote on which kite they like best.

But competitors go out to the field in various groups and they have to fly the kites on their own. Not only do the kites that, the kites have to be "fly-worthy" they have to do what they're supposed to do.

But then beyond that, we have artistic awards. So we have innovation awards and that will happen a little later this afternoon.

So, this morning is the competition for people who have made kites and most of these folks are amateurs who, you know some come every year and fairly sophisticated kites and others are kids who worked with mom and dad to make a kite out of newspaper.

And then in the afternoon we have some people who will do a "trick kite" demonstration and really a competition. It's just a clapping of hands, but they actually kind of choreograph these stunt kites to music.

Q: Wow!

A: And they rotate back and forth out on the field. And then we have a Rokkaku battle, which I believe is a Japanese tradition, where they're huge octagonal kites, 6 sides or 8 sides.

Q: Or 3-dimensional versus flat?

A: Well, they're flat, but they're huge. They take quite a large team, 5 or 6 people to fly them. And they actually, they battle. You try to twist your kite string around the other one and try to make that kite come down.

Now in the old days, we don't do it here, but in the old days, the kite string actually had glue and pieces of cut glass. So when they were going around and trying to circle the other kite string, and they would saw back and forth and cut the kite string. And then the competitor would be out of the competition.

Q: Wow!

A: As I say, we don't use string with glass now, we just use regular kite string. But we've had some fly away though, because still the lines break and we have a couple in trees every year we have to go up and get. But it's great fun and people enjoy that. So there's really something for everyone here today.

And kids can make kites, we have little give away kites. They can watch the competition; they can just sit on the grass and enjoy the beautiful day.