CIVIL WAR MUSEUM CLOSES, NEW VISITOR CENTER EXHIBITS TO BE CONSTRUCTED
Wilson's Creek National Battlefield announces the closing of the Civil War Museum on December 1, 2011, when the collection will be taken off display for cleaning and conservation work. The Civil War collection will return to public display, in new exhibits, at the Wilson's Creek National Battlefield Visitor Center in the spring of 2013.
The museum objects currently exhibited have been on display since 1992. Many are in
need of conservation treatment and new exhibit mounts to ensure long-term
preservation. During this transition phase, a team of National Park Service museum conservators from Harpers Ferry Center for Media Services in West Virginia will
examine the condition of objects such as textiles (flags and uniforms), leather
accoutrements and firearms. Some cleaning will be performed at the park, with more
in-depth treatment accomplished in the Harpers Ferry conservation laboratories.
The museum closing also allows the consolidation of visitor services that will streamline
park operations. "These exhibits are a temporary step while the park, along with the
Wilson's Creek National Battlefield Foundation, continue to work towards a long-term
goal of a future wing of the Visitor Center that will focus solely on the Civil War in the
Trans Mississippi West," according to Superintendent Ted Hillmer. "This change in
operations is a step toward achieving a goal identified in the park's General Management
Plan."
The museum building will be converted to office space for the Heartland Inventory and Monitoring Network staff, currently stationed at Wilson's Creek National Battlefield
in office trailers.
Wilson's Creek National Battlefield
Plans New Visitor Center Exhibits
Wilson's Creek National Battlefield is embarking on a project to update the Visitor Center and incorporate the park's Civil War Museum objects.
With a goal to display as many of the objects as possible from the current museum, project completion will allow all visitors access to all the available services in one facility, including an award-winning film, the Civil War Museum collection, and the John K. and Ruth Hulston Civil War Research Library. Today only 10 percent of park visitors take time to tour the current museum. During the exhibit development process, the Visitor Center will also be renovated to upgrade interior physical security, to improve accessibility by individuals with disabilities, and prepare the museum collection for display.
From September 13-15, 2011, park staff met on-site with the contracted exhibit design firm from Fairfax, Virginia, to begin the design process. The project will be in development over the next year. In addition to park staff, seasonal staff, park volunteers, and Wilson's Creek National Battlefield Foundation members participated in the planning effort.
"Exhibit projects are a collaborative effort," says Roberta Wendel, Interpretive Media Specialist with the National Park Service (NPS) Midwest Regional Office in Omaha, overseeing the project. "We have and will continue to involve a variety of subject matter experts throughout this project. Members of the Foundation certainly have a wealth of experience with the Civil War collection that can inform the stories told in the exhibits."
The park's collection contains an outstanding array of historic objects relating to the war west of the Mississippi, including the sword belt and sash of Arkansas Confederate General Patrick Cleburne, the telescope of abolitionist John Brown, and the flag of the Confederate "Cherokee Braves." These artifacts and archival records within the museum collection represent a nationally prominent and comprehensive documentation of the Civil War in the Trans-Mississippi West. The NPS purchased the Wilson's Creek Civil War Museum and museum collection in August 2005 because of its critical value in interpreting the Battle of Wilson's Creek and the Civil War in the Trans-Mississippi West.
A CALL TO ACTION
On the eve of our centennial, the employees of the National Park Service have imagined our second century of public service and charted a path to help us achieve that vision.
A Call to Action offers tangible, concrete ways for us to work together to transform our organization to make sure that we are ready for a future that is, in so many ways, different from our past. It includes bold new ideas and expands on terrific ideas that are already field-tested.
A Call to Action also signals the start of a strategic integration of national parks and National Park Service community-based programs. This will increase our reach and better leverage our resources to invite the American people to learn more about our mission and join us in the stewardship of our nation's most incredible places.
Every park, every program, every employee, and every partner has a role in this Call to Action. For it to succeed, for the National Park Service to succeed, we need your creativity, innovation, and dedication to make these action items real in your park or your program.
In this watershed moment, like no other time in our history, we have an opportunity to reflect on, celebrate, and build on our accomplishments as we prepare to serve for a second century. Please answer the call. For more information, click here.
Director Jon Jarvis
CIVIL WAR 150TH ANNIVERSARY EVENTS
For more information on Missouri 150th events, go to http://mocivilwar150.com.
Springfield-Greene County Library launches
"Community and Conflict" site
It was fought-brother against brother-nearly 150 years ago on our own soil, yet the Civil War remains of great historical and personal significance to Americans and a popular topic with the public. The Civil War may be the most thoroughly researched conflict in U.S. history, but the Trans-Mississippi Theater, and, in particular, the Missouri and Arkansas Ozarks regions, have not been documented as extensively.
Until now, that is. For the past two years, Library employees have worked to create a unique web site and online resource entitled "Community & Conflict: The Impact of the Civil War in the Ozarks." The project, made possible through a Library Services and Technology Act Digital Imaging Grant funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services and coordinated by the Missouri State Library, is a digitized collection of pre-Civil War, Civil War and Reconstruction era artifacts, including letters, maps, diaries, court and government documents and photographs.
The site, says historian Brian Grubbs, contains materials gathered from institutions and individuals throughout the region that "document life in the Ozarks during the tempestuous period of 1850-1875 through the exploration of urban development, slavery, agriculture, military life, women and children, civilian refugees and other issues that represent a crucial period in the history and culture of the region."
The site, www.ozarkscivilwar.org, opens with a stirring video documentary of moving images of the Civil War, and serves to introduce the themes and topics. A researcher's dream, the site features high-caliber scans of documents, transcriptions with side-by-side comparisons to scanned images, keyword, geographic and thematic searches, historic interpretation, links to other sites and bibliographic citations. "Most importantly, the materials on the site tell us," says Grubbs, "how the war affected the people, our ancestors here in the Ozarks, as they lived in one of the most contested regions of the country."
"Community and Conflict" includes items from the Civil War Museum at Wilson's Creek National Battlefield.
Marker Dedicated Near Dug Springs Skirmish Site
On October 7, 2008, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources dedicated a new interpretive marker commemorating the August 2, 1861 skirmish at Dug Springs, near Clever, Missouri. Those present for the dedication included Larry Toll, professor of history at Evangel College and member of Phelps Camp, Sons of Union Veterans (Union soldier); Jim Denny, historian, Missouri Department of Natural Resources; Alison Dubbert, historian, Missouri Department of Natural Resources, and Robert Clanton, member of Phelps Camp, Sons of Union Veterans (Missouri State Guard soldier). The marker is along the Wire Road on the south side of the Clever Middle School.
