Glass Rehousing

This morning, Erica and I started a new rehousing project – this time, we rehoused several dozen glass bottles and other glass objects that were taking up a lot of space in the drawers. Just as rehousing the spoons yesterday opened up a lot of space, rehousing these glass objects today will provide us with several drawers of space to rehouse objects this summer.

Glass objects were taking up an inordinate amount of room in the storage area and are scattered rather than housed together. With Bridgette's help, we decided to rehouse them into Hollinger boxes in the upright shelving area. In this area, objects are carefully packed into Hollinger boxes, which are stored on shelves.  Bridgette made us a list of glass objects in the general storage area that needed rehousing into Hollinger boxes. We began by pulling the objects from the list onto carts, which we brought down to the work area. We looked up the bottles in ANCS+ and saw that none of them had photographs, so we added that to our rehousing assignment.

One of two carts of glass bottles we rehoused

Some of the bottles in their original cases. We were able to reuse many of these housings, but some had to be redone because they posed danger to the objects. 

In the afternoon, everyone from the Heritage and Research Center had to go up to Mammoth for mandatory radio training, a two-hour class where we learned how to use the park’s radios. For my job, I will likely never need to use a park radio, but it was interesting to learn how the radio system in the park works and how the radios work. After the radio training, the HRC interns all attended a seminar by John Vucetich, head of an ongoing study about the predator-prey relationship between wolves and moose in Isle Royale National Park in Michigan.  

The lecture discussed the changing perceptions in the last fifty years about the predator-prey relationship between wolves and moose at Isle Royale National Park. At first, the relationship seemed to be top-down – that is, wolves were the dominant predators and moose the prey in the relationship. However, fifty plus years of research has proven that disease among wolves, climate change, fluctuations in availability of certain moss that moose rely on for food, and the population of ticks on the island all play important roles in the predator-prey relationship. For example, ticks are currently thriving at Grand Isle, and are preying largely on moose, therefore weakening them and making them easy targets for wolves.

After the lecture, we returned to the HRC and worked on the glass bottle rehousing for the last hour of work. With such a big break in the middle of the day, we didn’t get as much done as we would have liked, and will have a lot more to do tomorrow before we are finished with this project.

Spoon Rehousing

Today, Erica and I worked on rehousing several dozen decorative spoons that had been stored in a number of separate drawers. A new drawer had recently been dedicated to spoon housing, and we were responsible for moving the rest of the spoons into the newly dedicated spoon drawer to open up more space to put away objects we will be cataloging and rehousing throughout the summer. This would have been relatively easy if the spoons had been labeled clearly when they were originally cataloged. However, many of the labels were illegible so we had to either decipher them and re-label them appropriately. 

Deciphering the catalog numbers was a matter of trail and error in ANCS+, filling in the numbers around the legible numbers on the unreadable spoons until the correct object came up on the screen. Thankfully, the spoons had been photographed when they were originally catalogued, so we were able to match photos with the objects we were looking up. This exercise made me really appreciate all the object photos we have been taking as we catalog. Without them in this instance it would have been incredibly difficult to uncover the catalog numbers for these spoons. 

We finished the spoon rehousing project in the early afternoon. Afterwards, I worked on cataloging objects from my shelf of items to be cataloged. One interesting object I worked on was a wooden pipe with a carved buffalo attached to the top of it. I think the buffalo shaped area served some function, but I can’t say for sure. I housed the flute on a flat piece of blue board, poked holes in the board on either side of the flute in three places, threaded twill tape through the holes, and tied the flute onto the board with the tape. I also glued blocks of ethafoam to the blue board to secure the two ends of the flute and made handles for the blue board out of cotton tape to make it easy to pick up the tray.

Flute housing

Working in the Park

Today Erica and I went with Allie and Carolyn, the museum technicians, to do some work inside the park. First, we went to West Yellowstone to meet a courier at the visitor center and pick up one of Thomas Moran's journals that had been sent out for conservation. Moran accompanied the Hayden expedition and painted pictures of the Yellowstone area, which were used to convince Congress to establish Yellowstone as the first national park in the world. The HRC has twenty one of Moran's watercolor field sketches - a vital piece of Yellowstone history.

We left West Yellowstone and headed to the Fishing Bridge visitor center, where we corrected some small mistakes in the taxidermied bird exhibit. We removed the glass pieces in the front of the two cases that needed fixing and moved a couple of labels and specimens to their correct locations and then replaced the glass to front of the cases. This exhibit is a prime example of hazardous museum collections, as these birds were taxidermied with dangerous chemicals, including arsenic. When we opened the case, the smell was very strong, and it made me a little nervous. Luckily, we finished our work quickly and probably weren't exposed to too much of the chemical.

One of the cases we modified

The other case we modified

Hitting the Ground Running

After two days of training, today Bridgette set us loose to work on cataloging and rehousing on our own. In the storage area, each of the museum technicians are assigned two shelves. One shelf contains objects for cataloging and the other contains objects for rehousing. Bridgette keeps the shelves stocked with objects to work on. Today, I worked on objects from my cataloging shelf and made a pretty good dent in what was there. Here is a sample of some of the objects I worked on and how I housed them:

Circa 1920 Haynes souvenir playing cards, which each feature individual photos of the park. The Haynes family is a Yellowstone legacy who published thousands of photographic postcards and prints during the early years of the park. I housed these cards in an acid free box, which I lined with ethafoam. I placed ethafoam blocks at each end to keep the cards from moving when its storage drawer is opened and closed. 

This is a stack of 50 identical Yellowstone Park Hotels stickers. The photo of the bear in the center was taken by one of the Haynes family members. The bear was rummaging in one of the many garbage dumps that were scattered across the park in the late 19th century. Bleachers were erected at many of the dumps for park visitors to get close up views of bears, who would arrive at the dumps every evening for dinner. These dumps (and other early park management practices) made many Yellowstone bears reliant on this human food source instead of hunting and gathering their own food as nature intended. 

This insignia was used by many Yellowstone companies over the years, including the Yellowstone Park Company (YPCo.), Yellowstone Park Hotel Company (YPHCo.), and Yellowstone Park Transportation Company (YPTCo.). When cataloging items with this insignia, it can get rather confusing to date these objects, as each of these companies were constantly changing their name and many used the insignia at the same time. Luckily, this one reads "Yellowstone Park Hotels" so I was able to determine a date range of 1906 - 1936 for these stickers. 

I housed these stickers in a custom made blue board box lined with thin ethafoam. I secured the stickers in a stack (as they were made) with loosely tied acid-free twill tape and stored them in a drawer with like objects. 

Here are two examples of stickers that I housed in acid-free mylar sheets for protection. I stored them in an archival box with other historic park stickers. I wrote the catalog number in pencil on the back of each sticker and also slid a section of acid-free paper into each sheet that also contains the catalog number. 

Second Day of Training

Today, our collections management training continued with an early morning lesson on cavity packing, which is used to protect objects that need extra support. Cavity packing entails creating a space within ethafoam that fits the object snugly. We use a special tool that melts the ethafoam and allows us to dig pieces out in the shape we need. 

After the lesson on cavity packing, all of the new seasonal staff members shadowed a tour of the museum, library, and archive areas of the HRC. Later this summer, we will be responsible for the museum section of the tours, which take place on Tuesday and Thursday mornings and last from 45 minutes to an hour.

After the tour, Bridgette showed us how to upload object photos into the appropriate catalog files in the ANCS+ database.  When we catalogue/rehouse objects we will be uploading photos of them into the database.  These photos will help when staff is searching for objects, as this is primarily a research facility – a photo will save valuable time if the object is not what the researcher is looking for. Photos also serve as valuable visual records of objects in the collection.

In the afternoon, I cataloged, photographed, and rehoused several objects, including a teacup and saucer, dinner plate, and small platter. 

Collections Management Training

All day Monday, the museum interns trained with Bridgette, the museum registrar. The first part of the training consisted of an in-depth tour of the HRC museum storage area, during which we learned how to navigate the collections area, open different types of locking cabinets, and find specific objects in storage. After the training, we did a storage area scavenger hunt. The museum keeps objects in several different kinds of storage cabinets, including shelfs, drawers, pull down doors, and more. We were given a list of object locations and we had to figure out which cabinet, drawer, shelf, box, etc. the objects listed were located at. The scavenger hunt was helpful, because it allowed us to find things on our own, and I always learn the best by doing.

After the scavenger hunt, Bridgette gave us an overview of proper object handling techniques, which made me realize just how much I learned in Dixie’s registration class. I was pleased that I already knew everything she told us. Even so, it was great to have a review before handling objects myself.

After the object handling review, we moved on to a box building lesson, in which Bridgette taught us the basics of building storage boxes out of archival quality materials, including blue board, ethafoam, and acid free hot glue. The museum has several shapes and sizes of pre-made acid free storage boxes, so we learned how to determine when to make a storage box or container and when to use one that is pre-assembled. Basically, we learned to keep things simple and use a pre-made box whenever the objects will fit in them without too much excess space. Space is at a premium in the HRC storage area, so conserving space for growth of the collection is extremely important. When pre-made storage boxes are too big or too small for objects, it is best to make a box from scratch using by cutting blue board with a razor, hot gluing it together, and creating custom padding with ethafoam and other acid-free materials. During this lesson, I also learned different ways to mark objects with their catalog number in a way that is both safe for the object and inconspicuous.

After the lesson, we got to put our new knowledge to the test by making boxes to store objects in need of rehousing. I made a container for a set of syrup pitchers with depictions of Old Faithful on the front. I made a long, rectangular box that separates the two pitchers with blocks of ethafoam glued to the inside the box. After gluing the box together, I lined it with ethafoam and then glued in ethafoam blocks to separate and protect them. It is best to keep similar objects or pieces of sets together, and this box accomplished that.

One of the syrup pitchers I made housing for

The housing for the syrup pitchers 

(it may not be beautiful, but this was the first time I have done this!)

The syrup pitchers resting safely in their new housing

After lunch, Bridgette trained us on the ANCS+ database, the NPS wide collections management software. In the database, we have to enter lots of information, including object descriptions, condition reports, measurements, materials, time period, accession number, catalog number, housing location, and more. After watching Bridgette show us how to enter objects into the database on a projector, we returned to our desks for hands on use of the program, where we had the opportunity to enter new accessions into ANCS+, make boxes for them, label them with clear varnish and acid free pens, and photograph them (these photos will be linked to the objects in ANCS+). The object I worked on was a 1950’s era souvenir – a small leather case with three dice inside that is engraved with “Yellowstone Park”.

The dominos and case

New housing for dominos 

I separated the dominos from their case because early plastics like the ones the dominos are made of were made of unstable materials which may damage the leather case over time.

Today, we also learned about re-housing (this will be one of our big projects for the summer. There is a large backlog of objects that are already accessioned and cataloged but have not yet been put in containers or been put into museum storage. Our responsibility will be to make custom storage containers, find and place them in appropriate storage locations, and update the object locations in ANCS+. We will also be housing and cataloging newly accessioned objects and entering them into ANCS+, which includes creating photographic records (and linking them to ANCS+), making custom storage containers for them, marking them with their catalog numbers, and putting them into appropriate storage locations.

Week One

My fingerprints finally cleared with the FBI on Tuesday so I was able to start work. I attended a Mammoth employee orientation meeting all day on Tuesday, at which different department heads talked about NPS history, rules and regulations, and safety on the job. My favorite speaker was Lee Whittlesley, the park historian, who spoke about the Grand Tour of Yellowstone, in which early park visitors traveled from hotel to hotel in horse drawn carriages over the course of a week or so. I loved hearing the visitors' descriptions of the park - people don't write like that anymore!

On Wednesday, I arrived at work at 7 AM and headed out with Colleen, the museum curator, to get signed in with the Human Resources department and get my ID card, which provides access to the restricted areas of the museum. Right after we arrived at the Human Resources department, the power went out and showed no signs of coming back on, so we headed back to the HRC. The power was still out when we got back to the museum, but it came on right before we left for our second full day of meetings. 

The meeting on Wednesday was for the Center for Resources, the NPS department that the Heritage and Research Center falls under. There were presentations from all the branches of the department, including Environmental Quality, Research, Acquatic Resources and Wildlife, GIS, Resource Management, and last but not least, the HRC. 

Thursday morning Colleen brought me to get my ID card. On the way, we dropped off a fascimile of a poster that has hung over the fireplace at the hotel in Tower-Roosevelt for years. The original was filthy so the museum had it conserved and provided the hotel with a copy to replace it so that the original would no longer be compromised. 

After we returned to the HRC, I did some readings out of my orientation binder, a reference that includes information on the National Park Service, Yellowstone, the HRC, and NPS museum standards. 

Orientation Binder

From 10 AM until around 2:30 PM, all of the HRC employees attended an archives seminar taught by Nancy Merz of the Rocky Mountain Office of the National Archives & Records Administration (NARA). The seminar was a great introduction to archives practices and procedures and I really learned a lot. 

For the remainder of the afternoon, I set up my NPS email account and took the internet security training, which taught me the rules and regulations for working on a government computer. Now that I am able to work and have finished attending all the orientation meetings, I am really looking forward to doing actual museum work next week!