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Park will remove fee on select days
Entrance fees to Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park will be waived on the following days in 2013:
» Monday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day
» April 22-26, National Park Week
» July 13, 33rd annual Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park Cultural Festival
» Aug. 25, National Park Service birthday. The National Park Service was founded on Aug. 25, 1916.
» Sept. 28, National Public Lands Day
» Nov. 9-11, Veterans Day weekend
Extended visits get $75 reward
A Waikiki Parc Hotel promotion is giving travelers $75 credit if they stay for at least four nights.
The "Parc Chic 75" credit can be used at Nobu Waikiki, Halekulani’s award-winning restaurants and SpaHalekulani.
For details, call 921-7272 or visit www.waikikiparc.com.
Smithsonian site to laud ingenuity
WASHINGTON » The Smithsonian Institution announced plans Wednesday to create an innovation pavilion with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in one of the oldest buildings on the National Mall.
The 132-year-old Arts and Industries Building has been closed since 2004 due to structural problems and has been undergoing repairs.
Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough says the building will celebrate American ingenuity as it did with its first major exhibition of inventions in the 1880s.
The building was first used in 1881 for President James Garfield’s inaugural ball.
The building will be reopened in 2014 with patent office funding to begin housing exhibits and interactive programs for seven years. The patent office will provide up to $7.5 million, Smithsonian spokeswoman Linda St. Thomas said.
In recent years, Smithsonian Institution curators have worked with the patent office to develop exhibits about the history of American innovation.
King Herod items to go on display
JERUSALEM » Israel’s national museum is preparing an exhibition on King Herod, the Jewish ruler under Roman occupation two millennia ago.
The display, billed as the world’s first on Herod, includes a reconstructed tomb and sarcophagus of Herod, known for huge building projects, including the biblical Jewish Second Temple in Jerusalem.
The exhibit features about 30 tons of findings from his lavish palaces.
Israel Museum director James Snyder said Tuesday it’s the museum’s largest and most expensive archaeological project to date. The exhibit opens Feb. 12.
Palestinians object to the exhibit because it displays artifacts from West Bank sites. Archaeology official Hamdan Taha says the project was not coordinated with the Palestinians and violates international law.
The museum says it will return the antiquities after the exhibit closes in nine months.
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