National Portrait Gallery Director Alan Fern, who recently lost a bitter public battle over how much space his museum would have in the building it shares, will retire. The gallery is part of the Smithsonian, and uses art to tell the history of people and events. Under Fern’s direction, the gallery’s collection doubled to more than 18,000 pieces and began including popular cultural and sports figures. Last year it had 432,000 visitors. – Washington Post