All the Presidents’ Memorabilia

Jordan M. Wright’s collection of political memorabilia is unquestionably prodigious.

Consisting of perhaps a million-plus items, amassed over four decades, it includes an assortment of ephemera like a George W. Bush piñata and a portrait of Lincoln made of seed and saplings, but also legions of important historical artifacts, like a George Washington picture flag from his swearing in and a purse with a Warren G. Harding logo that was used to attract newly enfranchised female voters.

Hundreds of the pieces were featured in a 2008 exhibition at the Museum of the City of New York. Most recently, the Smithsonian Institution expressed interest in acquiring a few thousand items from the collection, which was also the subject of a 2008 book by Mr. Wright. But today, none of the artifacts are available for public view. For almost seven years, the collection has been unceremoniously sitting in boxes and crates behind the orange roll-up doors of storage units in Long Island City, Queens.