The International Museum of Espionage in Washington is the best place to see with your own eyes and make sure that all kinds of things “with a secret”, such as shoes with a built-in gun or a button with a video camera, are not inventions of writers and directors, but ordinary everyday life of secret agents or spies.
We should note right away that the Washington spy museum is not the only one in the world. There is another one in Finland (Tampere), but it does not compare to the U.S. one. Washington has the world’s largest collection of spy artifacts ever assembled.
At the International Spy Museum, you can do more than just see photos of famous spies and read or listen to their biographies and watch a movie. Here you can see more than 600 exhibits – items formerly belonging to and seized from the spies. These include hidden video cameras, eavesdropping devices, an umbrella with a syringe containing deadly poison (just like in the movie Umbrella Shot), a lipstick pistol, sunglasses with a built-in video camera and other spy gadgets. There’s also a shooting car.
Note at once that almost a quarter of the museum is devoted to the relationship between the Soviet Union and the United States during the Cold War (an entire exhibition hall), and another quarter is devoted to the best spy of all time – Agent 007,” according to www.usa.one. The rest of the museum presents to your attention a variety of interesting facts about the lives of spies and their work.
But that is not all. The museum constantly hosts various interactive exhibitions, where you can explore, touch and experience everything. You can easily imagine yourself as a spy and crawl through, for example, an air vent, or play in a spy quest, check out yourself how bugs work and much more.
Museum Exhibit
The museum’s collection consists of more than 600 artifacts. It is the largest collection of international espionage artifacts ever placed on public display. Many of the museum’s exhibits are now on public display for the first time. The spy items on display in the museum highlight the work of famous spies and key acts of espionage, and help bring to life the strategy and methods of spying in world history.
One of the museum’s halls is devoted to the history of Soviet and later Russian intelligence.
The mission of the International Spy Museum is to educate the public about espionage, to tell the story of spies’ activities in a compelling way, and to promote understanding of the important role of espionage and its impact on current historical events.