Wamalug: Event: June 20, 2026: Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum Sally’s Night

Wamalug was part of an event, held each June around the anniversary of Sally Ride becoming the first American woman in space, celebrating Ride’s accomplishments and legacy and shining a light on women in STEM, in which our participation was billed as “LEGO Displays.” The event lasted from six to eleven o’clock in the evening, the museum does dim a bit after sundown.

Mike brought his completed LEGO Technic 42182 NASA Apollo Lunar Roving Vehicle - LRV.

Constantine had older sets, including LEGO Ideas 21312 Women of NASA (featuring Dr. Ride), LEGO Ideas 21104 NASA Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity Rover designed by Wamalug member Stephen Pakbaz, and LEGO Technic 8480 Space Shuttle from 1996. He had also recently completed a minifig-scale Canoo electric vehicle (which had been planned for use in transporting astronauts to the launch site before the company went bankrupt) and assembled figures of the Artemis II crew recently in the news for their trans-lunar mission, and built a minifig-scale Astrovan—the recently retired Airstream Excella motorhome used for astronaut transport since the mid-eighties.

Dan had even older sets, with LEGO 6544 Shuttle Transcon 2 from 1995 and LEGO 1682 Space Shuttle from 1990.

Bret had a build of a never-completed NASA proposal for a satellite to communicate with future colonies on the moons of Jupiter or Saturn using long-wave radio.

Sherry had a large mosaic of the United States Space Force logo.

Sunny had joined us to tend to the play brick, but someone who doesn’t use the household calendar had forgot it, disappointing a number of guests. Sunny also took a number of photographs of the Wamalug team before the show began.

Dan was our liaison to the museum, and Wamalug would like to thank the staff for inviting us, securing on-site parking, providing a secluded eating space on the staff-only third floor, and delivering lighting cubes when we said it wasn’t this dark last year.

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