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Pittsburgh banker and later Treasury Secretary Andrew W. Mellon began gathering a private collection of old master paintings and sculptures during World War I, eventually focusing his efforts on establishing a new national gallery for the United States. In 1930-1931, the A. W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust made its first major acquisition from the Soviet sale of paintings from the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. When the Smithsonian Institution’s National Gallery director retired, Mellon asked the Smithsonian secretary not to appoint a successor and instead endow a new building with funds for expansion of the collections. Mellon’s trial for tax evasion led him to modify his plans and in 1937, he formally offered to create the new Gallery. On his birthday, 24 March 1937, an Act of Congress accepted the collection and building funds – provided through the Trust – and approved the construction of a museum on the National Mall. The new gallery was to be effectively self-governing, not controlled by the Smithsonian, but took the old name “National Gallery of Art” while the Smithsonian’s gallery would be renamed the “National Collection of Fine Arts” – now the Smithsonian American Art Museum. The new structure was completed and accepted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on behalf of the American people on March 17, 1941. Neither Mellon nor Pope lived to see the museum completed.
(Wikipedia)
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