Preservation Technology Podcasts (U.S. National Park Service)

Episodes

August 27, 2021

102. Discussing the Display of Mummies with Curator Gina Borromeo (Episode 102)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons, with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join Catherine Cooper as she speaks with Dr. Gina Borromeo, Curator of Ancient Art at the Rhode Island School of Design Art Museum. In this podcast, they talk about Gina’s work on redesigning the RISD Museum’s Egyptian Art exhibit and the museum’s decision to rehouse the mummy, Nesmin, in his sarcophagus.

Gina Borromeo: The redesign and reinstallation of our Egyptian mummy—and that is of a Ptolemaic money of a priest named Nesmin—Nesmin and his coffin has been at the RISD Museum since they were acquired in 1938. Since that time, they have always been on view separately; the mummy on one side and the coffin on the other. I would say that in the past couple of years, we have had certain programs and projects in the museum that began to question whether it was okay for us to continue to display a human body in the museum. These projects were based on a discussion called Double-Take where we invite two different experts to discuss one object from two points of view. During that discussion, which happened between a professor of criminal justice and an anthropologist, it was brought up that the idea of displaying a mummy in the museum was problematic and specifically, the displaying of a human being in an art museum.

That was also followed closely by a project made by a RISD MFA student who had a program here that spoke all about the display of black bodies in particular. Here, he was really asking the question whether we would show a mummy if it were not of an Egyptian, weather we would feel equally free about displaying a white body. In addition to that, there was a Brown BA thesis that discussed various displays of mummies in the United States.

I think these three programs together made us rethink our approach to this display. Some of the questions they raised were: “Is a human body of work of art?” Then another one was, “Does the human body belong in an art museum? And if so, should it even be on view?” Then they brought up the fact that we would probably not display other human remains in an art museum, particularly Native American human remains because of NAGPRA considerations in this country. They pointedly asked, “Well, what makes it okay to show an Egyptian body?”

I think we had to come face to face with the questions, or actually the realities, that we have always seen Egyptian mummies on view in museums so much so that they have become normalized and we began to question that idea. Is it in fact okay to continue to do so just because it’s become normal? I think we started thinking that, well, no. Just because Nesmin no longer had descendants who could speak on his behalf, didn’t mean that we had permission to continue to show his body in this very public context.

Also, it became clear to us that we could still continue to talk about Egyptian religious traditions and even Egyptian religious beliefs about death and about the afterlife, but didn’t have to show the mummy anymore. In fact, the coffin itself could stand in as the object from which we could educate our viewers about all these issues.

Catherine Cooper: It sounds like there were a number of different aspects that you had to mediate in redesigning the exhibit. How did you handle those different voices?

Gina Borromeo: Well, first of all, this was a very difficult decision and one that I did not want to make alone. So, I engaged other members of the museum staff in this discussion, certainly the director, the deputy director, our conservators, our registrars or installation staff and even other curators, as well as outside experts, outside Egyptologists and anthropologists, were part of this discussion process. In the end, the major points of consideration were continued care for the mummy and the coffin. We wanted to make sure that whatever we decided to do would not damage the mummy any further or the coffin. We have to remember here that these have always been on view separately. Essentially, that wooden coffin has not held the weight of Nesmin’s mummy since the 1930s and we were really afraid that the wood had become brittle. There were cracks throughout the coffin. We were really scared. I don’t think that’s an overstatement of the situation. We were scared to put the weight in and we were afraid we would further damage the coffin. It was interesting because our conservator, brilliant conservator, Ingrid Newman, decided that perhaps we should place little tissue bandages across the cracks of the wooden coffin so that when we put the weight of the mummy back in, we could see whether those cracks would tear the tissue paper and if so, that meant that we were causing damage to the wood and that the wood may not be able to take the mummy’s weight anymore. Fortunately, that did not happen, but I have to tell you that when we were putting the mummy into the coffin, a lot of us were holding our breaths and there was a visible sigh of relief when we discovered that in fact, the coffin was stable enough and could still hold the weight of the mummy and that essentially, it was still good for its original purpose.

I would say that a second consideration in our decision was also consideration for museum visitors because while I would say a great majority of our visitors are school children come to the museum to see the mummy, it is a highlight actually if they’re sixth grade experience here in Rhode Island, they come to the museum to study ancient culture; so ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome. They have come to expect to see Nesmin in the museum. We had to let people know that we would no longer be showing him, but I have to tell you about something else that I think not a lot of people know and that there have been instances where our visiting public, and I’m speaking specifically about these sixth graders, there’ve been instances where their encounter with Nesmin is their first experience, their first vision really, of death. For some children, this has been a traumatic experience. I have heard of teachers who have had to take children out of the room because they were so shocked and disturbed by seeing a dead body in the museum. These are things that I think the general public doesn’t know about, but I felt very strongly about the fact that we had to think about our museum visitors. The RISD Museum, I don’t know if you’d know it, but it is a small museum, so we don’t have a space that we could segregate with a notice outside that says, “You are about to enter a room with human remains.” I think visitors can just be roaming around the museum and immediately, before they know it, be face to face with the mummy and the coffin of Nesmin. So this is a way of also, not shocking people into that experience if they were not prepared for it. Also, we worried about the coherence of the display. Because we would be taking the mummy off view, we had to deal with a whole other side of the case, and we’re talking about a custom made climate controlled case here that was quite expensive and that we could not make modifications to really. We couldn’t move the support, we couldn’t move the stainless steel framing supports that held the shelf for the mummy and the coffin. So we had to think about what we should put on the other side and we were able to find painted mummy portraits from the Roman period to put on the other side. But I would say that if I had my choice, I would really prefer to lower the coffin a little bit right now because you really can’t see the top of the decoration on the coffin, but we had to deal with the limitations that we had and not being able to make modifications to the case.

Catherine Cooper: In rehousing Nesmin and changing the display, it was also an opportunity for further education of why this display had changed and why RISD has Nesmin, and you were able to work that into the display, correct? Gina Borromeo: Once we made the decision to put Nesmin back in his coffin, we focused on how to make our decision process transparent to our visitors because I think it’s a really good illustration of how museums decide to do things. We decided to make videos that when you visit the museum you can access, and we decided to make these videos so that they addressed specific questions that we thought people would want to know about. The first question and the first video deals with, “What do you see on the coffin?” Essentially, what can we learn from the text and images that are on Nesmin’s coffin? Then the second video addresses how Nesmin got from Egypt to Providence in 1938, so his history of ownership and where we think he might have been excavated and how he passed from one private collector to another before he eventually made his way to RISD. Then the third, and I think perhaps the question that is most interesting to a lot of people is, is a body of work of art? This basically answers the question of why we chose to put Nesmin back in his coffin. We had invited an anthropologist and an Egyptologist to talk about how ancient Egyptians viewed bodies and mummies and how that has changed from antiquity through today. Basically, touches also upon the history of the display of mummies in museums. That was very interesting. I would say for the most part, I’m really happy with the way that display turned out and really quite happy with the videos. But should things change in the future, I know that what we did could easily be reversible and we can improve on these videos, so I leave that open. I hope that we could make this display even better for our visitors. Catherine Cooper: Have you gotten any feedback that you’d like to share on how people have received the change to the exhibit? Gina Borromeo: When people realized they could no longer see him, at first there was, I wouldn’t say an outcry, but people were asking questions, “But why? But why?” And gradually, now, over time, people have said, “Well, Oh goodness. Those are actually valid questions. I’m glad that the video is here to help me understand why you did what you did.” So I guess that’s positive feedback. In this display, we really felt a responsibility to the mummy of Nesmin and the coffin, so we took such care with it. We were concerned about making sure that we did not cause harm to the mummy of Nesmin and the coffin that we in fact, practiced the move several times before we actually did it. Our manager of installation, Steven Wing, made a model of the mummy that was about his size and weight and we wrapped it in linen as we would eventually wrap Nesmin. Then with members of the installation crew and with the conservators, we practiced lifting him out, lifting him from his shelf. We did this so we could identify where possible issues might arise and so that we could find solutions together about we have to support him more specifically here, and we have to lift this part up just a little more when we put him into the coffin. At the time we actually made the move, it was done in one smooth movement. These decisions, obviously it was not taken lightly, but we tried to prepare as much as possible for the move of Nesmin back into his coffin. I like to think that he is finally now in his intended resting place and that he is finally getting the rest that he’s so, so deserved and that we had temporarily interrupted. Now, he is back in the coffin and resting quietly we hope.

Catherine Cooper: Thank you so much for sharing that process with us.

Gina Borromeo: Thank you, Catherine, for allowing me to do so.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Dr. Gina Borromeo, Curator of Ancient Art at the Rhode Island School of Design Art Museum. In this podcast, they talk about Gina’s work on redesigning the RISD Museum’s Egyptian Art exhibit and the museum’s decision to rehouse the mummy, Nesmin, in his sarcophagus.

July 9, 2020

101. Running a Small Museum during the Pandemic (Episode 101)

Transcript

Catherine Cooper: Thank you for joining me today.

Allison Titman: Thanks for having me, it’s great to be here.

Catherine Cooper: I’d like to start with asking you to introduce yourself and the museum.

Allison Titman: Sure. I’ve been at the museum a little under a year. It’s a really cool place and has about 35 helicopters on display outside and inside. When we’re open and not in the conditions of a pandemic, several of those helicopters are actually interactive because we want people to understand—as much as they can without taking flight—what it’s like to really sit at the controls and to pilot a craft like that. We also offer helicopter rides, have special events for holidays, do all the fun museum type activities that everybody else does.

Prior to being at this museum, I was actually at the American Alliance of Museums as an Accreditation Program Officer, where I worked with museums of all types and sizes as they prepared for, and then achieved, accreditation.

And in case all of that isn’t enough work, I’ve also been involved with the Small Museum Association for about ten years. I am currently the President Emeritus of the Board.

Catherine Cooper: How is small museum defined in the United States?

Allison Titman: I would get that question all the time when I was the one fielding emails for SMA and my answer generally is, if you feel like your museum is small, then it is small. People throw around different definitions based on budget and staff size; it used to be under 250,000 dollars annual budget, now I hear more under half a million, something like less than five staff members or less than ten, but it’s really hard to define. So, what I say is a small museum is one that feels like it doesn’t usually have the resources it needs to meet its goals but figures out innovative ways to meet them anyway.

Catherine Cooper: You have mentioned that we are currently in pandemic times, how has that affected your museum?

Allison Titman: Well like every other museum, we’ve had to close. We closed on March 13th [2020] and are still closed, though we’ve just been notified that museums in our region will be able to open over the next few weeks. During that closure, myself and the one other full-time person transitioned to working from home. Unfortunately, I did have to furlough my six part-time staff members because without earned revenue, we just weren’t able to sustain our usual staffing levels.

During the closure, we’ve been working to maintain operations in terms of finances and the essential tasks we have to do to keep the place running. I’m also trying to take advantage of this time to do some behind the scenes work on how we use technology and other systems to make sure that we’re streamlining our work as much as possible, so that when we go back, our lives are hopefully a little easier. I’m also, like every other museum, applying for all the various funding opportunities to help us get through this crisis. And I’ve had to work on a phased reopening plan, looking at what kinds of cleaning and disinfecting procedures and safety protocols we’re going to have to institute to open safely and then putting those on paper, so that our staff and our volunteers and our visitors all feel safe reentering the facility.

Catherine Cooper: Could you tell us any details about that plan, sort of how it fits in with the phased reopening of your region or museum practices that everyone has been discussing?

Allison Titman: Sure, so it’s a combination of information from my region, information from federal sources like the CDC, and then thinking about how our museum works and how to integrate those things into our operations. And I think all Directors and all operations staff members and other people with similar responsibilities have been cobbling together the same things. It’s challenging to take a set of CDC protocols on cleaning and disinfecting and then think about how that applies at my 30,000 square foot building, 15,000 square feet of which is a big gallery full of helicopters, but which also has a museum store, staff offices, two commercial tenants, a theater space, an archives, a library and I’m sure other people are grappling with the same things.

Our most popular spaces are our kids’ helipad area and then our interactive helicopters. Both of those spaces are meant to be really heavily hands on. They’re supposed to engage all ages, but especially those learners who might not be reading yet but who can really experience things using their other senses. We use helicopters as a gateway to STEM education, and we feel like those hands-on experiences help to make that connection between helicopters and aviation to larger concepts for people of all ages.

So, we have had to think through what spaces have to close because they’re just too high touch we can’t keep them open, versus what we can keep open if we make sure to clean more heavily, and to make sure that people understand really what the experience is going to be like in the new normal that we’re all having to deal with.

Catherine Cooper: From speaking with colleagues who work at other small museums, how similar or different have their pandemic experiences been from yours at the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center?

Allison Titman: My friends and colleagues have really had a variety of experiences. For me, I’ve been at the helicopter museum less than a year, so I was still in a phase of doing some organizational transformation in terms of our goals and our programming and what we were really trying to put in place to build on for the future. So, I have colleagues whose institutions are more settled who have solid programs in place, who have been able to make really impressive pivots into virtual programming. Friends are doing things like virtual story times, and turning an education program that was previously in person into a zoom-based experience. And then being able to reach out to institutions like local libraries that are looking for virtual programming and partner with them.

I used to be on the Board of the Greenbelt Museum in Greenbelt, Maryland and as they think about reopening, they’re seeing a phased approach, where the first thing they bring back is their walking tours of Greenbelt. That’s an outdoor experience that people can engage in more safely, whereas the museum itself is a house from the late 1930s that’s less than 1000 square feet. So, you can’t put too many people in there at one time at this point.

So, people are really thinking through what kind of existing programming they have and how to pivot to make it fit our current conditions. And then we’re all dealing with some uncertainty around the future. Whether that’s financial uncertainty, whether it’s not knowing if visitors are going to come rushing back to our institutions when we reopen or whether it’s going to be a trickle at first. And then how people will respond as we have to make adjustments over time. If we can’t have our signature events or if we have to really reduce our capacity, will our audiences understand why and really work with us to follow the safety protocols we feel like we have to put in place.

Catherine Cooper: How can members of the public help small museums at this time?

Allison Titman: So, during the pandemic I got a new phone system at the museum because we had a traditional system where the phones rang to our desks, which didn’t work when we weren’t at our desks. So now the museum’s phone rings through to my cell phone, and I’m the frontline staff picking up all the calls.

So, the first thing the public could do that would be really helpful is just to be understanding. I know that there are people who really want to get out of the house, and who really need a place to take their bored kids now that their summer breaks have started, but some museums just aren’t permitted to be open yet, and some are still putting their safety practices and protocols in place and aren’t ready.

So, members of the public should just keep an eye on museums’ Facebook pages, websites, anywhere they’re posting information to see when they’re reopening, if they’ve had to adjust their hours, if they’re asking people to buy tickets online in advance. It’s really helpful if people take a second to plan their visit and to look up the information before making a phone call or before just showing up. And then if the public really care about an institution, it’s great if there is a way for them to financially support that museum. If they can’t do that, can they share the museum’s Facebook post, or forward the emails, or tell their friends how long they’ve been a member of the museum and what a great experience that’s been? So, whether people have dollars or can just extend the museums reach, that’s all really helpful right now.

I think right now, we’re all trying to figure out what the future looks like. And we’re having to think about the short term because that’s where our heads are, that’s where we’re all working. Either our museums have just reopened their doors or they’re working towards that, decisions are having to be really immediate.

What I think is coming, and we’re starting to have to grapple with, are the longer-term implications of this pandemic and what the lessons we take away from it are.

When I worked in accreditation in 2018, we were still seeing museums who had not rebounded to their pre-2008 recession levels. So, cataclysmic events like this affect museums for years and years and years. But on the bright side, these kinds of events give us a good opportunity to plan for the future. What can we put in place now or over the next year or two years, that will help us weather the next crisis? How do we build more sustainable institutions and how do we become more resilient? And I don’t say that lightly, I know it’s not easy. I know that small museums in particular, but all museums in general, tend to feel under resourced and to feel like it’s really today that they can handle and the future that has to wait. But I think that if we can learn from this crisis, that we have to plan and we have to put a strong foundation in place, we can at least take something positive out of what has been a fairly negative experience.

And if nothing else, at least it shows that we are all in this together. It really is museums across the globe that have had a hard time and it’s been wonderful to see people talking to each other.

We might be stuck at home, but we have access to people across the country and across the world and our museum professional organizations have really stepped up to offer helpful resources. So, the American Alliance of Museums, AASLH, ASTC, all of the museum umbrella organizations and then the disciplines specific organizations, have really tried to help their members and the field at large.

So hopefully, no one feels like their museum is struggling through this alone.

Catherine Cooper speaks with Allison Titman, Executive Director of the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center in West Chester, Pennsylvania. In this podcast they talk about how the pandemic has affected small museums.

June 23, 2020

100. UHawaii Hilo students caring for ‘ohana at Kalaupapa (Episode 100)

Transcript

Recent HOPE Crew at Kalaupapa National Historical Park.

K. Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation, Technology and Training. Today we join Jason Church as he talks to students from the University of Hawaiʻi Hilo. In this podcast, they talk about the students’ cemetery preservation work at Kalaupapa National Historic Park.

J. Church: You’ve been here now for a week and a half doing cemetery work here at Kalaupapa, so introduce yourselves and let’s talk about what you’ve been doing.

Darienne: My name is Darienne Marie Kaiaʻokūlaniakea Kealoha, I go by Darienne.

Nanea: Aloha, my name is Naneaikealaula Victoria Thomas and I go by Nanea.

Cody: Aloha, ʻo Cody koʻu inoa my full name is Cody Koʻokāne Pacheco, but you can call me Cody.

Kinohi: Aloha ʻoe, my name is Kinohi Pūkaua o Kamehameha Neves and you can call me Kinohi.

Sheldon: Aloha, my name is Sheldon Takeshi Keoni-Kawikaonalani Rosa and you can call me Sheldon.

J. Church: What interested you in doing this project? Why here and why the cemeteries?

Cody applying D/2 to a grave before scrubbing with a natural bristle brush.

Cody: Well first, before I think we talk about the importance of being here, we should talk a little bit about the history of this space and so where we are located right now is a peninsula on the island of Molokai and it’s called Kalaupapa. This peninsula at precontact time had Native Hawaiians living and residing here but in 1866, that’s when the first leprosy patients were brought to this settlement. There were nine of them, there were six men and three women. And at that point in history, Hawaii was experiencing a very drastic change in the way that our native populations dealt with leprosy and how our ancestors were dealing with that disease, which at the time, had not cure.

And so, this settlement which is about two by two miles long and wide, totally trapped off from the rest of our islands because of the two thousand foot pali or cliffs on one side and then being surrounded completely by the ocean on the other side. And so, you can think of it as a natural prison and so when our government was dealt with the leprosy epidemic that was occurring, the Board of Health decided to take these people from our communities who were dealing with leprosy and put them in this landlocked prison of some sort.

And so, that started in 1866 and since then…it ended in 1969 and in between 1866 and 1969, roughly eight thousand patients were brought to this peninsula and so the reason that we’re here is because that eight thousand plus patients that were buried here and died here have graves and markers. Not all of them but those that do have that, we’re here to just mālama take care of them.

Kinohi: Mahalo Cody, for all of his manaʻo it’s important to go to the history because when you hear the history, you’d assume that everyone would want to be here, but for a lot of schools and this was brought up during our week here, that sometimes this subject is not covered in our classes. I know in my education, it wasn’t really a subject in school. As he mentioned, there’s eight thousand patients and during our work days here, we’ve seen a lot of familiar names. Some family members that we didn’t know had family here and maybe they don’t even know our friends connection here.

For me, my parents have always told me that there was a family member that was a resident here. That drew me into being a part of the class, being involved and to reconnect that family tie.

Nanea: Like Cody and Kinohi said this place has a lot of very important history here in Kalaupapa for a lot of us students, it’s personal history. We are called here, not only a privilege but in great honor to be able to come to this space and mālama each and every single grave on this peninsula. A lot of us are called here because we do have family here, whether we are able to identify their tombstone or not, every single grave on the peninsula is ʻohana to each and everyone of us and it’s very special too when we do find our ʻohana because whether you see the name or you hear someone say the name out loud and you’re like that’s my ʻohana it’s bigger than an oha moment, it’s that connection that just…it roots you even more to this space and really makes you appreciate just being able to be herea

Hilo students scrub a concrete grave marker removing biological growth.

Darienne: To go off of what Nania was saying and then to go all the way back to Jason’s question about why we applied, it was something that Kumu Kai mentioned in one of her history classes. It was just that she was going to have this class and if you want to do it complete the application with an essay and when I did the essay, it was the first time that I really thought about whether or not I have a connection here, or how much my family doesn’t know about Kalaupapa. And when I started to ask my family members, they didn’t even know what island Kalaupapa was on or like what it really was. All they knew was, oh yeah, some Hawaiians got sent there and they were isolated from everyone else.

When Kumu Kai put it out there that we were going to come to Kalaupapa, it felt like a tugging sensation and it felt like something I had to apply for, and I had to make sure that I was going to come here, and I was going to be able to be on this trip. And like everyone has said, we all have connections, but we don’t always know about it.

Yes, so the more I learned about Kalaupapa, the more questions I asked my family and I found out that I did have family here and had I not got that tugging sensation to come to Kalaupapa, I wouldn’t have asked about our family history here or even if we had history here.

When we went to ʻĪliopiʻi it just so happens that my family was there that day. I didn’t think much of it when somebody told me, “Oh, I found a Kahihikolo over here, maybe check it out.” As soon as I got to the grave, I burst into tears. And I think everybody saw me just like crying on the side to myself. That was something that kind of brought it all together for me was that feeling of connection to my family and to my culture that I don’t really get to experience that often.

Rinsing the grave marker after cleaning with D/2.

Sheldon: That we can clean the gravestones and how we can mālama and take care of the kūpuna so that we can remember it, we can pass on their stories, because you know we all have a kuleana here. We all didn’t get to experience this teaching of what Kalaupapa is and what the trauma that these patients went through. So, we all have a responsibility here to teach this to our children and to the next generation to make sure that they know this history, because if you don’t pass it on, then it’s gone.

Cody: Today, Kumu Kai asked me a question in the field that we were working in, she said, “Cody, are you learning things from this workshop? What have you learned if anything?” And amongst the many things that I listed to her in response to that question was, that the ability and skills that I’ve gained in learning how to mālama and take care of these gravestones and the connections that are built when you take care of them, is something that I’m going to take home to my families graves.

And I know…when I was a kid, my family would always on Sundays go to a cemetery where a lot of my ʻohana is buried and it’s been awhile since we’ve gone but I know that a lot of the graves of my ʻohana is falling apart or the soil is running away and just being in this workshop, constantly I’m thinking about how now I have the tools and the skills and the desire more to go back home and take care of that ʻohana that I know deserve more. And so, I really appreciate that from this workshop.

Nanea: Like Cody said, how to properly tend to cemeteries, specifically gravestones and thinking about the gravestones that I can access and tend to back at home. When I was young, my mom used to take us to Kona of the island, which is where most of my family is buried and we were never allowed, me and my siblings were never allowed to eat McDonald’s and so when we’d visit the cemeteries, we’d buy one bag full of all cheeseburgers and we’d go eat our little McDonald’s at the cemetery. And I didn’t like pickles so I’d give pickles to the grave sites and then the fries that don’t make it into the little fries’ box, they would get dumped into the bottom of the bag, we’d dump it on the graves so they could enjoy it with us. And so now going home, I can do more than just give them my pickles, I can you know, properly scrub them, pull the weeds and tend to them, so I’m really excited and grateful to have learned all this knowledge on proper tombstone care and take that home to my ʻohana there.

When I think about it, there are over eight thousand patients buried here and only about one thousand, a little over one thousand of which are visibly marked graves. And so, when we research them and then see their graves, we get to, each person gets to mālama their person a little bit extra and then when they tell their story, it’s a way for us to do our…a small part in making sure that each person is remembered.

Student uses a bamboo skewer to remove biological build up from the inscription.

Kinohi: As Sheldon was talking about how he talked to Uncle Mike and that he describes this place as a forgotten place, I would say for whoever is listening that, that connection to us should be that where ever our grandparents, our uncles and aunties or whoever is buried, that that place doesn’t become a forgotten place as well. That we learn from Kalaupapa that where our family is buried doesn’t become Kalaupapa as well. That we stay connected just as we reconnected here in this place.

Darienne: On the first day when Jason, Molly and Rusty was talking to us about what we’re going to be doing for our time here, I don’t remember who said it but somebody said to ask for consent before scrubbing the graves and when they said that, I thought it was funny because we all knew we were going to do that anyway. That we were going to ask for permission to be in that space with our kūpuna before we work in the first place. And then something else to mention is that Aunty Mikiʻala it took some time to explain to us the different signs of our kūpuna saying, “Okay yeah, you guys can come in, it’s okay” and some of the ones that she talked about was hearing the manu or like the bird chirping, is it a happy chirping or is it like a warning chirping. If it’s a happy one, then obviously, yeah you can go ahead and if it’s a warning, then maybe we should go somewhere else or maybe we should work on something else or it can be like the change in temperature and the wind or a feeling that you get, knowing that it’s okay to go in or it’s not okay to go in.

Sheldon: I would like to say thank you whole crew and Jason, Rusty and Molly for coming down as well as NPS for allowing us in here. Thank you for hosting us and giving us this awesome opportunity to give back to our community and give back to Hawaiʻi to the patients that lived here. Giving us the opportunity to reconnect with these people and to connect back to Kalaupapa. We now all have a kuleana that we need to ʻauamo or carry, a responsibility we get to carry and we’re thankful that you opened that avenue and that gate for us to be able to explore this and to learn how to take care of our kūpuna. It’s been an awesome experience and it’s going to be a memory that I’m going to cherish for the rest of my life.

Kind of ending it on “He Mu” it’s a protocol we do before we leave so that all the negative energies, of spirits perhaps, you know they’ve never seen people in a longtime sometimes. So, when they see us young people coming down, they get excited and they want to talk. So, we do this just to tell them like, goodbye. Please stay where you are and don’t follow us back and just to keep them where they should be, because you don’t want to be taking this energy with you because it can affect your life.

That’s what a lot of people have been saying to me before I came here, like don’t bring anything back. So, they gave me a bunch of salt, like make sure you leave Kalaupapa at Kalaupapa. But yeah, I’m just making sure we let them know like, okay we are leaving and a hui hou, never aloha but always a hui hou, until we meet again.

UH Hilo students: Chanting “He Mu”.

K. Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.NCPTT.NPS.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody

Jason Church talks to students from the University of Hawaiʻi Hilo. In this podcast, they talk about the students’ cemetery preservation work at Kalaupapa National Historic Park.

June 11, 2020

99. Finding and Preserving LGBTQ Southern History with the Invisible Histories Project (Episode 99)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join Catherine Cooper as she speaks with Josh Burford and Maigen Sullivan, the co-founders of the Invisible Histories Project. In this podcast they talk about the Invisible Histories Project and their work finding and preserving queer history in the South.

Catherine Cooper: What is the Invisible Histories Project and how did you come to start it?

Poster presentation on the Charlotte Queer Oral History Project

Maigen Sullivan: We are a 501C3 non-profit. We’re not a traditional archive or a traditional education, but our main focus is LGBTQ history and archiving. We act as an intermediary between organizations like museums and libraries and universities and LGBTQ people in the south. So, we’re trying to connect folks and locate histories in order to get them preserved and researched. So that’s basically what we do. It’s a little unusual, there’s not a lot of folks doing that because we don’t actually have that kind of physical archives space and we’re not a university, but we act between them in order to preserve that history in Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia as of March this year. And we also manage a network of archivists, historians, just people interested in queer and trans southern history. It’s called Queer History South, which is a conference where we get together, and we just talk about best practices. How do we find this history? How do we preserve it and how do we make it accessible?

Josh Burford and Maigen Sullivan, co-founders of the Invisible Histories Project

Josh Burford: I think how we got started is very typically a queer story in that there was this gap. We were looking for information about our own history. We were being asked information about our own history and we didn’t have access to it. It wasn’t in traditional repositories, it wasn’t in libraries, it wasn’t being studied at universities and so, we took it upon ourselves to do what a lot of southern queer people have done, which is grass roots organize to locate and preserve our own history.

The nice thing is Maigen and I have both been in higher ed in the past. We understand how it works. I moved to Charlotte in 2012 to build an archive for the city of Charlotte—an LGBT archive—and so, while I was there, Maigen and I talked about the possibility of taking this city-wide project and turning it into a state-wide project in Alabama. Since we’re both from Alabama and both from the deep south, it made sense that that’s where we would start.

And now we’re a regional project within in two years. There’s just so much material that needs to be collected. We’ve collected sixty-three individual LGBT collections in Alabama in the last eighteen months. We’re on track to double that number in the next two years and we’re on track to have collections that wide and in that much scope in Mississippi and Georgia. We’ll be at five hundred, six hundred collections in three states in four years.

Catherine Cooper: What materials does the project seek to collect and are you actively looking for these collections?

Josh Burford: Yes, we are actively collecting and so if you can imagine a spreadsheet in your head for a second, you know there is a whole section that’s just stuff we’ve already collected with all the data. There’s a section of collections that have started but we haven’t picked up materials. So, that list is probably around seventy or eighty individuals and groups. So that we’ve contacted them and then we’re working with them. And then we have our research collections. I mean, the one from Georgia has gotten so big, so quickly and we’ve only really been officially in Georgia since March.

So, we are working with donors every single day. I mean I was on the phone with donors this morning, I have donor meetings the rest of the week and even though we’re distancing, you know we’re looking for ways to continue the process.

Josh Burford and donor with the first disco ball from a gay bar in Tuscaloosa

Every single donation that we pick up—and I think this is part of the benefit of doing a grass roots-based project—is that I see every donation that we pick up as access to fifteen or twenty additional donors and donations. Because we are asking people when we pick up their materials, who influenced you? Who were your people? Who was your community? And so, the work quickly fans out especially because of the connectivity between Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia. There’s so much shared history there.

As far as what we’re collecting, I mean it would probably be easier to list what we’re not collecting at this point. But you know, the traditional manuscript collections, so letters, photos, documents related to organizations, meeting minutes, posters, flyers, the usual stuff that you’d see in an archive. But because, to make Maigen’s point, we’re not a traditional archival repository, a lot of 3D collections; so, dresses, drag performance gowns, Mardi Gras textiles, banners from gay pride festivals, we’ve got the very first disco ball from a gay bar in Tuscaloosa, which is in our office currently.

Maigen Sullivan: The good thing about us, is because we’re really focusing on community accessibility, that’s our number one goal for materials. So, we have a number of repositories that we work with and these are both local, state repositories as well as some national partners that we negotiate what that will look like and then we can work with the donors to get their materials to the right place.

Ideally, something would stay local, so if it came from Birmingham, Alabama, it would go to Birmingham Public Library. However, everyone has restrictions on what they can take and size and specialty, so if there are pieces, we do like to keep things together, but let’s say that there’s a really critical piece like a disco ball, that can’t just be stored anywhere, we will find the repository that is invested in storing that kind of material in order to make sure that it’s the right fit for the archive as well as the donor.

Catherine Cooper: So that actually very much speaks to the next question which is, what is your process for housing and preserving and it’s these partnerships…

Josh Burford: Yeah, and I think the layer that we have that a lot of traditional archival repositories don’t have, is that we have integrated social media into our work. We also have amazing archival repository partners, so if we get a piece in and it’s in really bad shape or it’s like Maigen’s point, like a disco ball, like where’s that going to go? We have a network of people we can reach out to immediately and find out. So, we’re not saying no to collections right away, but we get the chance to bring collections in to IHP, to do what we call a pre-sort. So, we’re able to organize the materials as they come. So, it doesn’t matter what shape they’re in. We work with the donor and then we get it figured out.

Alabamians marching on Washington as part of a large rally calling for lesbian and gay rights; October 11, 1987

Then we get to take photos of material, we put that on our social media. We get to look at what the collections are about and then start building lists of individual people we want to work on the collections because we’ve got this huge network.

I think, if things had been different in our world at the moment, this summer we would have had four different graduate and undergraduate students in Alabama, all working on a different collections.

So, we’re pushing the material out, we want people to see it and handle it and to look at it and to photograph it and to write about it and to experience it. So, for us, the preservation piece is very crucial so that people can see it from now and a hundred years from now.

But Maigen is right, accessibility is at the top of our list because as we’re very fond of saying, the difference between archiving and hoarding is a very important distinction to make. It’s not enough to have it in a box. It’s not enough that it’s safe. It needs to be available to the public.

Maigen Sullivan: We also provide support for the repositories and the universities that we work with. So, you know you’ve got all this stuff coming in, sixty collections really fast, that is very overwhelming. So, what we like to try to do is give this information up front; this is what’s in this collection. We’ve worked with the donor, they understand what is and what isn’t archivable. We’ve gone through and cleaned things up and then we work with universities in the three states that were to bring in graduate archival students that will help fully process. You know, write up the finding aids, organize everything, help store it and then give everything to us, so we can connect with researchers, either on student level or a faculty level who want to come in and research the material and get that out into the public as well.

So, we’re helping a lot of these folks get the things that we donate to them ready for research and accessibility pretty quickly because these students are, they’re killing it. They come in and they’re like, boom, boom, boom, forty boxes, what’s that?

Josh Burford: It’s also nice to be able to plan for the future of individual materials that we’re getting. We get requests all the time for things like LGBT identity and southern religions, or lesbian history. As we’re bringing collections in, we already have a working list of people that we can reach out to, even before we’ve picked up the actual boxes and say, “Hey, I want you to know that this is coming.”

Because of that we’ve been able to build coursework at so many of our institutional university partners so that undergraduates are working with primary documents. They’re digitizing for us. They’re describing collections, they’re creating subject headings for search.

Catherine Cooper: So, for people who are looking for getting access to these collections, what do you recommend?

Josh Burford: Well I think the easiest place to start is our website, which just went through a facelift and so it’s really beautiful and people should look at it, InvisibleHistory.org. It’s a good place to start because we’re listing out our institutional partners and our collections by state. If they follow us on social media at all, they’ll be able to see the collections literally as they arrive on our doorstep.

And then, we push people to our repositories so that they can make the initial contact. Anybody that were working with, if you pick up the phone and say, “I’m looking for this collection, IHP brought it to you,” they can get it to you.

Lesbian Avengers from Mississippi State University, October 1995.

Maigen Sullivan: We are on Instagram and Facebook the most, we’re at Invisible Histories Project on both of those. We are technically on Twitter, but we are not great at Twitter, but you can find things there.

Another thing too, if people are looking for something, if they’re interested, if they’re doing a project or if they have materials that they want to donate, we get a ton of hits on social media, they’re like, “Hey, I have this 1940’s piece, is this good?” They can email us at contact@invisiblehistory.org, and we can work with folks to figure out what would be best, particularly with everything being so weird right now, trying to get them access to the materials is going to be a little tricky because like Josh said, most of the stuff isn’t digitized right now at least.

Catherine Cooper: What are the ways you’ve been able to use these collections in your education programs?

Maigen Sullivan: We do a lot of talks, we do a lot of presentations, we have worked with queer youth centers and we have a traveling mini exhibit that represents mostly Alabama right now, but also Mississippi and Georgia.

The biggest thing was in the beginning, well even now, this material was not widely available. It wasn’t collected and if it was, it was oftentimes hidden under weird headings or unacknowledged or not processed. So, we have spent, at the beginning time, just getting the materials, just finding them and bringing them in. We are now to a place where we can do more education.

Photo of Frank Bowers, a drag performer from Birmingham, AL in the 1920s.

Josh Burford: And we’re not starting from scratch, because obviously there have been queer historians before, but because we’re new and because people know who we are now, at least on some level, we’re able to try different things that maybe people haven’t done before. So, we launched a digital project called, Drag Family Trees and so we’re having drag queens literally, physically map out their drag families for us, like their drag mothers and siblings are. And then at a certain point coalescing all that material together so that you cannot just see the evolution of an individual drag queen but all the connectivity between all of the deep south states. I mean there’s so much connectivity between Atlanta, Birmingham, Jackson, Mississippi and New Orleans, just in that I-20 corridor. And anytime we can get primary documents in the hands of undergraduates, I’m delighted.

Maigen Sullivan: So, we’re working with organizations and individuals who are involved in some sort of queer organizing or movement, to archive what they’re doing right now. So, we come in yearly with different organizations, different individuals, we say, “Okay, what do you got from this year,” so that we can create plans that we can go ahead and integrate, with things from the 1920’s, with things from the turn of the century, with stuff from the 2000’s, so that young folks can understand that you’re a part of history and that all of these actions that you take, add up and matter at some point. And I think that’s been really great to see as we’ve worked with folks.

Catherine Cooper: For people who want to get involved both now and when we’re allowed to meet in person again, what would you recommend?

Maigen Sullivan: The first thing is to follow us on the social medias, check out the website, email us at the contact Invisible History. If you’ve got questions, we do have a few ways for people to get involved. All of the archives that we work with are shutdown.

So, we can’t keep producing social media posts like we used to, so if folks have queer southern photos that they would like to share with us, we would love to get them, to feature them online. We’ve started a YouTube series, where we sit down and talk with different folks doing queer history work across the country or who are involved in queer organizing. So that’s available if folks want to just see what people are doing and ways that they can get involved outside of IHP. Just shoot us and email if you’re interested and we’ll figure things out.

Josh Burford: Something else that we want people to know about is that we’ve launched a new program called, Archiving at Home, which now has a tab on our website. You can click on it. Basically, it is a step by step explanation of the process; how you go from a closet full of materials to an archivable collection step by step. It explains both, what kind of materials we’re looking for, how you should be putting things together, etcetera. It also explains digital documents, so like what you can do for digitization. If you have digital clouds, how we preserve those.

People can download the PDF, they can start working on it and if folks live near us in Birmingham, Jefferson or Shelby county, you will actually physically take them boxes and so, they can have boxes on their front door safely and start putting stuff away, which we really appreciate.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Catherine Cooper speaks with Josh Burford and Maigen Sullivan, the co-founders of the Invisible Histories Project. In this podcast they talk about the Invisible Histories Project and their work finding and preserving queer history in the South

May 21, 2020

98. Hawaiian Studies at the University of Hawai'i Hilo (Episode 98)

Transcript

Student Group: Chanting “Ua Ao Hawaiʻi”

Kevin. Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation, Technology and Training. Today we join Jason Church as he talks with students from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo. In this podcast, they talk about the Hawaiian studies program at University of Hawaii.

Student Group: Singing Hawaiian Song.

Jason Church: Introduce yourselves and tell me a little bit about the program.

Makoa: Aloha, mai kākou my name is Kekamamakoaaka’ilihou Kaleilani Caceres but I go by Makoa.

Emma: Aloha, ʻO wau ʻo Emma Kawaikahi Tanigawa, I just go by Emma.

CJ: Aloha, my name is Kenneth Clinton John Sweezey and I go by my middle initials, CJ.

Makoa: But to best explain Hawaiian studies, UH Hilo is really a place where the Hawaiian language is kind of revitalized, so a lot of our professors nowadays were the original folks who first made the first Hawaiian language text book. So, a lot of our focus is on revitalizing the Hawaiian language because it was almost a dead language at one point prior to the first Hawaiian renaissance in the 1970 -80s. But we learn a bunch of different things involving language and culture. So, we have this thing called Kumu Honua Mauli Ola, which is the foundation of what a Hawaiian identity consists of. So, that includes language, spirituality, body language and all sorts of things. Throughout all of our courses at UH Hilo, base all of the coursework on those foundational beliefs.

Jason Church: So, what kind of things do you study in the program?

Emma: Besides language, we also study things such as traditional uses of native Hawaiian plants, we study traditional mele, traditional hula, we also have a papa iʻa class which is a class about ocean animals, fishing, stuff like that.

Makoa: There’s two pathways; so, there’s continuing the culture, which a lot of those courses focus on the revitalization of language and prepping you to become a teacher. So, UH Hilo actually has the only teacher accreditation master’s course that’s completely done within Hawaiian language and that program is really meant to prepare some of our students to become teachers in the Hawaiian Immersion programs that the state provides. For those parents who put their children and want them to be educated primarily in the Hawaiian language. And the other pathway, monitoring the culture, that’s kind of where they try to connect the Hawaiian studies program to all the other disciplines. So, some of the classes that count towards that degree our marine science programs, a lot of anthropology programs, history classes and that kind of stuff.

Jason Church: So, what drew you three to the Hawaiian studies?

Emma: Okay so, when I joined the Hawaiian studies program, my main goal for myself, was actually to learn as much traditional knowledge as I could in order to help educate others that do not have this same opportunity regardless of age, regardless of gender, regardless of race, because I feel like even in public schools all across Hawaiʻi, they don’t really have a good strong foundation when it comes to Hawaiian studies being implemented within public schools. Developed, not only in schools but also in like all of Hawaiʻi and help it become our traditional knowledge, become more normalized.

CJ: I think that when I moved back home to Hilo, I went and lived with my grandfather, who I have never had a relationship with and he’s from Kalapana. Just learning from him, learning about that side of the family made me realize that I wanted to learn more about this place that I call my home or my second home.

Being back in school, especially in higher education in college has allowed me to really open many doors to learn about it.

Makoa: So the reason that I ended up joining the Hawaiian studies program, my parents met at UH Hilo and they were both in the Hawaiian studies program back in the late 90s.

When I was born, I was put into a Hawaiian Immersion preschool Aha Punana Leo o Kona and then as soon as I graduated from there, I went to kindergarten, from kindergarten through sixth grade, I was taught primarily in Hawaiian, in one of our Hawaiian Immersion schools, at Ke Kula Kaiapuni ʻo Waiau.

So, throughout my entire life, the Hawaiian language was all I knew and Hawaiian studies, wasn’t something that I needed to study to know, that was just my life was Hawaiian studies. Everything that I was taught from my parents, and everything at home is basically what I’m learning in class now. So, it makes it really easy for me.

The reason why I decided once I graduated high school, to jump back into it was because I felt my Hawaiian ideology that we have this thing called ʻO wau ma kuleana, which means to take care of your responsibilities. But to say that kuleana equals responsibility isn’t completely true. It’s more a part of who you are, it’s more a part of your identity, that you’re not your truest self unless you’re doing what you’re supposed to be doing for the betterment of your community.

And so, learning about my past, learning about my language, learning about my culture, it takes me one step closer to who my ancestors meant for me to be and that was a vital person within our world community.

I think that what we learn at UH Hilo, which is really unique compared to other universities, is that in order to make our world a better place, we need to take ourselves back into the mindset that those of indigenous culture had, that that’s the future that we want. And that’s something that we’re learning here in Kalaupapa is that community and all of the foundational beliefs that are instilled within those communities, it is our duty, it is right to become those vital people in that community. And that’s what you learn at Ka Haka ʻUla or the Hawaiian studies program at UH Hilo.

Jason Church: So, every morning here at Kalaupapa, you guys have done what’s called…what you call piko?

Makoa: First think of the word piko, it means center. So, like our human body we have three different piko’s and each piko connects us to a different part of who we are. So, at the top of our head there’s a piko and that connects us to our ancestors. Our bellybutton, that connects us to our mothers and our genitalia, that connects us to our future generations. So, piko, if all of your piko’s are in alignment, then that means that you’re in balance.

So, every morning we hold piko, because we’re trying to re-center ourselves, we’re trying to focus all of our energies so that we can ensure that whatever kuleana whatever responsibilities we have, that we are in a place where we can take care of those responsibilities.

Emma: With that being said, that’s why we choose certain mele to perform every day and along with that, we also have, well it’s tradition that the kāne [men] get their mana’o and that following that a wahine will come and give her mana’o based off of what the kāne had previously said and build off of that for the day.

CJ: Even when we say the E hō mai which is like asking for knowledge, right, I really like that because that’s what we’re trying to gain right now, we’re trying to gain knowledge from you Jason, you know from your preservation work, we’re trying to gain knowledge from the kūpuna here, like Mikiʻala and stuff and from our professor Kumu Kai and from one another. You know, we’re learning the weʻre feeding off of one another, so I really appreciate it and I wish more of my classes incorporated that type of protocol or that type of ritual…

Emma: I think growing up on Oahu, no one in my family spoke the language. No one in my family danced hula. No one in my family sang or knew any Hawaiian mele. I feel like after entering the Hawaiian studies program, I’ve learned so much about what it means to be Hawaiian, what it means to be Kānaka Maoli. I’m just very grateful for that.

Now, I’m teaching my family all these mele, I’m teaching my family hula, I’m teaching my family about all these traditions that they didn’t have the privilege to learn growing up. So, not only am I reconnecting to my ancestors but I’m helping all my family reconnect to my ancestors.

Makoa: So, I would say, kind of building off of what they’re saying, being a student at UH Hilo, not just in the Hawaiian studies program, but being a student at UH Hilo, just in general.

We’re in a very unique circumstance because there’s a lot going on in our communities, in our local communities makes our learning a little more important, makes our learning a little more interesting.

So, for example, Ka Haka ʻUla O Keʻelikōlani which is the name of the Hawaiian studies program at UH Hilo, came as a result of basically a bunch of our elders rebelling against the state and making their own illegal schools where they taught their children in Hawaiian. The Hawaiian studies program came as a result of those struggles.

Being a student at UH Hilo, which is located on the big island, during a huge controversy such as the thirty-meter telescope being built on Maunakea, it kind of teaches you that knowledge that you learn in the classroom is most important outside of it. So, I feel like especially at Ka Haka ʻUla O Keʻelikōlani and especially being a political science major, learning all of these different strategies about how to advocate for indigenous rights, indigenous beliefs, indigenizing an educational system, that’s what makes being at UH Hilo awesome. Because we’re seeing the struggles that we’re learning about in classrooms happen live outside of our communities.

We can walk outside of our classroom, look up the road and see the mountain that, to us is sacred; a very large telescope is being proposed to be built up there and so I think that’s kind of the coolest thing that I’ve learned. I’m taking everything from one of my classes, bit by bit, and learning how to use that information to advocate on behalf of my people, our people, and I think that’s, yeah, that’s what makes me a UH Hilo student.

Student Group: Singing “Hawaiʻi Ponoʻī”

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Jason Church talks with students from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo. In this podcast, they talk about the Hawaiian studies program at University of Hawaii. Speakers: CJ Sweezey,Emma Tanigawa, Jason Church.

May 7, 2020

97. Applying Polymer Science in Conservation (Episode 97)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join North Dakota State University’s Alison Rohly as she speaks with Drs. Stuart Croll and Dante Battocchi. In this podcast, they talk about Dr. Croll’s work with conserving modern art and Dr. Battocchi’s work with conserving metal sculptures.

Alison Rohly: Dr. Croll, given your physics background, how did you first become interested in art conservation and how does your background in physics and polymers align with modern art conservation?

Dr. Stuart Croll

Stuart Croll: Well, firstly I have to say that I studied physics because that’s the way my brain works. It seems to be what I’m probably best at in terms of the science and technology fields. There’s probably no linear connection between physics and art conservation at all. And in terms of how my background applies, I liked and studied physics because I was always interested in how the world around me worked—that’s the natural world as well as the technological world. Although I had to study it, I was never interested in nuclear particle physics or quantum theory or anything like that. I was much more interested in what I could see and how it worked and I suppose in that regard there was a natural sort of focus on material science and then polymer science became a natural part of that and coating sciences proved to be a natural part of that and a lot of artwork work is coatings and very similar materials.

Everything, my sort of scientific and interest inclinations, fit very well actually in many ways because a lot of the problems that appear are not only chemical related but they’re sort of physics and engineering related too. I actually started my interest in art conservation and when I was about your age. I was at the National Research Council in Canada as my second job actually, ever. And I was studying the internal stresses generated in coatings where they try and kill us. That’s the evaporation of solvent and the cross-linking, densification, and all the rest of it and all these stresses tend to cause cracks and you see that they became brittle. And I published a handful of articles and then the Getty Museum got in contact with me and we exchanged letters in those days. And I ended up going down there. So I was in Canada, in Ontario, and I went down to the Getty.

It was only in the Villa in those days on Santa Monica Boulevard. No, on the Pacific Coast Highway in Santa Monica. And so I went in after hours, and I talked to their one technical person at the time, and he was interested in the work I’d done and why and how paintings cracked and how other works of art are cracking and what might have caused that and all the rest of it. And then he showed me around. I had my own personal tour of the museum and the backrooms where they looked at things and so on. So, and it made a huge impression on me at the time and so I was sucked in there and then.

Then, a few months later, a museum in England got hold of the same articles and we exchanged letters. I didn’t actually go there, but… So I was fascinated to realize that there was this world where my research was relevant, that I’d never really thought of before. It’s always nice to be appreciated, isn’t it? I mean, it just sort of lay in the back of my mind for decades and then we were approached here actually, and that’s how the interest here started. So Dr. Bierwagen and I were sitting there doing our booth duty at a paint show about 2002 and then two scientists approached us at the desk. One was from the Tate Gallery in London, England, and one was from the Getty museum in Los Angeles. And it ended up they wanted us to do some work.

Alison Rohly: So related to that, could you specifically talk about a project or two you’ve worked on as it relates to art conservation?

Stuart Croll: Well, I could talk about that one actually because it was all about modern art. Turns out modern art is now not so modern anymore. Many of the pieces we think of as modern art are actually 50, 60 or more years old and in need of fixing in some way. And most of my interests actually have been, most of my work has been, on what you would call modern art because of that. So, the project for us here was in two parts. One was to make latex that would correspond to the latex paint that the artists were using basically in the 1950s. So we found an old formulation and Dr. Webster’s students made a latex. My part of it was to try to solve some mysteries that they were discovering, because these two places—the Tate in London and the Getty in Los Angeles—had started ramping up their analytical capabilities and so a lot of good spectroscopy and chromatography and they were looking at the materials in modern art, trying to understand what they’d got and how to fix them.

And they were finding all sorts of compounds in the modern paint that they’d never seen in old paintings. So my part of it was to go back—and this is where NDSU played its role because at NDSU in the library we’ve got all these old books that date from the start of the coatings industry as an industry. All the old books, they could take formulations, a lot of old journals and digests from the Ag. school here—they’ve all got old formulations and what sort of materials would have been in paint from the nineteen hundreds and then through the 1920s and 1940s and onwards. So my part was to try to look at the formulations of particularly the latex paint that would have been used by artists in the 1950s and 1960s, and deduce which were the most likely ingredients in those formulations.

So I spent months pouring through all the archives of NDSU and what they wanted as the final outcome was the top six most likely latexes, the top six most likely greater TiO2 pigments, the top six most likely surfactants, the top six and so on and so forth. Just to give them a clue as to A. what they would expect to find and get from their analysis and give them a clue as to perhaps where they could go and find more details so they could deal with their art problems with more confidence, I suppose, they were going to do the right thing.

Alison Rohly: What do you think are some major challenges in this field from a scientist’s perspective?

Stuart Croll: Well, in many ways they suffer the same challenges that we do. So modern art really I suppose started perhaps between the World Wars and uncertainty boomed hugely after the Second World War. At the same time, the number of different polymers and coatings and plastics and other materials was booming as well.

So the artists had all these materials to try to get whatever effect they wanted to get and combine them in ways they what actually is would offend you and I with other aspects. Since, as I said, these works of art now in need of repair, restoration, conservation and understanding because although the artists might’ve used materials they bought at a local hardware store, most of the time they never recorded which materials they were. So in order to understand and fix them and so on, conservation scientists need to understand very exactly what the composition is of whatever it is, and why and how it’s doing—progressing towards failure the way it is. So they need to be able to analyze the composition of a variety of materials in combination that you and I wouldn’t think of, so they’re interest in high end spectroscopy and chromatography and microscopy is profound these days.

You and I understand the interest and need for nondestructive testing. But you and I don’t care if when we put an instrument on a surface it leaves a small mark. We don’t really care, they do. So we must provide them with nondestructive testing techniques that don’t touch at all, don’t leave any trace of their use. And if we can’t do that, art conservation scientists are allowed to take tiny, tiny samples from artworks. Well from places that the owners and viewers don’t notice, but they have to deal with tiny, tiny quantities of sample. You and I might think were hard done by if we have to use only a few milligrams or something; I’m talking another order of magnitude or so smaller than that because the job is to do no harm to the artwork but still deal with all the issues.

There’s this huge interest in analytical techniques—it’s one of the trends. There are a few labs around the world in partnership with museums and galleries and art conservation scientists, where they’re using some seriously big analytical facilities. There are groups in Germany, France, and this country where they go and use the national labs’ synchrotrons to get high beam, high intensity beams, I would say x-rays or something, so they can examine a tiny, tiny samples and get all the information out to it. They can and that was unheard of a dozen, 15 years ago, but now I have such an interest in analytical techniques.

The NSF in this country gives grants for that sort of thing. Occasionally, not often, but occasionally. They have the same sort of interests that we would understand. I suppose in some ways you’d have to say it’s slightly more extreme ways. One of the problems that modern materials have brought is fixing waterborne artwork, waterborne coatings, so did latex paint. You’ve got to be able to repair it in a way that doesn’t change or damage the existing. We are intrinsically waterborne ourselves, so every time we touch it… so they have to learn compositions in materials they can use for filling in cracks and so on. They can then remove from a waterborne coating without damaging the original material.

Modern art, since the second World War, has had a lot of organic pigments available. Well, in the old days it was easy to tell whether this pigment was a cadmium based one or an iron based one, something like that. But now you’ve got all these pigments which are only slightly different one from the other and they’re all the same carbons, hydrogens, oxygens and so on. Getting an exact match to the original color that the artist used, it’s not trivial when you’re faced with all the organic pigments that we know about now.

And in the old days, old masters’ paintings were typically varnished, so you could disguise essentially the difference in gloss between the repair and the original material by just covering it was varnish which brought the gloss across the whole thing to the same value as well. If you’re trying to touch up, say, a big metal sculpture where there’s a bit of rust or something’s happened in one corner, you’ve got to not only get the color exactly right, but you’ve got to get the gloss exactly right. So we have to match gloss as well as match the colors. So this is lots of things to think about.

Alison Rohly: Dr Battocchi, how did you first become interested in bronze art and architectural conservation and how does your background in materials and coatings help with your approach to conservation?

Dr. Dante Battocchi

Dante Battocchi: My interest in conservation comes from a long time ago when I was a friend with a student who was developing a polymer under a grant from NCPTT; she was an artist and a chemist and so she was developing a selectively removable polymer to be used in art conservation. I was doing another project, but we are very good friends and so I kept learning and listening about what she was doing and got an interest in this bronze art conservation field. And when it was time that I decided to open a small business, Elinor Specialty Coatings, and we were deciding what to produce and what to develop as a product, we decided to go with that particular polymer. We licensed it from NDSU and we developed it into a commercial product. So I’m still in contact with Tara and I keep her informed of what her polymer is becoming. And I discuss pretty regularly with the NCPTT on what’s going on and stuff like that.

It’s two fold. A friendship and also the commercial opportunity. I am a jack of all trades in materials. I have a couple specific interests, but I pride myself that I can approach different people in different areas. And so conservation, especially metal conservation, has a lot of little aspects. I think that my background helps me to tailor my solutions or my discussions to the specific problem. Conservators have very, very wide, broad interests. Sometimes I think it’s good to be a little more of a generalist to understand what they need and what they are looking for.

Alison Rohly: Excellent. So could you specifically talk about a project or two related to bronze art protection?

Dante Battocchi: Yes. One of them that we hope is going to give us good visibility is that we provided the product that is called Bronze Shield, based on this polymer that was developed here at NDSU, to a conservation company that applied it to the Arthur Ashe statue at Flushing Meadows in New York. Flushing Meadows is where the US Open of tennis are played. We hope that that is going to be our showpiece to show that the material actually works, and it really does the job.

The second one, my first approach was that I’ve been invited once to a conservation site and there was a very big statue from the 1800s of the general on a horse. And so I worked with the conservator to clean it and to take out the old coating that we didn’t really know what it was. We re-did the patina and we applied a clear coat and then the wax. That one was my first approach to see how conservators worked and how deep they work; even on a big piece of metal it needs to be because the surface needs to be accurately cleaned and worked inch by inch. So I like that.

Alison Rohly: Excellent. And that’s sort of where the Bronze Shield developed was initially from the company that you started and now it’s being applied currently to various statues and sights.

Dante Battocchi: Yes, we have been in communication with a lot of conservators in the past few years. A few of them and knew about the work at NDSU and now they all know the product from the commercial side. And so we have been giving and selling it to conservators for their projects, mostly for private conservation projects but also for municipalities and stuff like that. So for public art.

Alison Rohly: So from your perspective, what are some of the most relevant challenges today with specifically bronze art conservation?

Dante Battocchi: Just to take a general approach. I think that every conservator has a personal approach to what product or what solution needs to be applied to the particular [object], so it’s kind of a difficult endeavor to give a product and have them test it, because testing takes a lot of time and everybody wants to give it a little of a personal touch. Another way is that there are lots of bronzes that are out in the field, they have old conservations on, so that is a very difficult way to de-paint or to strip the paint on, especially if there are not too many records available for that. Some staff just have more records on previous work than others.

With my commercial hat, one very difficult thing to do is that when we give out the product for testing, it is very difficult to get feedback back. I don’t know if that one is a question off the length of the test or because when one project is done it is out of sight and out of mind. But having that feedback will be very important to know if the product or the polymer or the solution needs to be further developed or if it’s okay like that. It’s challenging on the scientific side to keep the surface protected, but with the ability to remove whatever coating we put on for the future removal, but also, on the product side, it would be good to know if it’s working or not in the current time to see if we need to modify something or not.

Dr. Alison Rohly

Alison Rohly: Excellent. Well, thank you so much for taking the time today to talk about your research with us and conservation.

Dante Battocchi: Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov until next time, goodbye everybody.

Today we join North Dakota State University's Alison Rohly as she speaks with Drs. Stuart Croll and Dante Battocchi. In this podcast, they talk about Dr. Croll's work with conserving modern art and Dr. Battocchi’s work with conserving metal sculptures.

April 20, 2020

96. Advocating for preservation with the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana (Episode 96)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Planning. Today we join Catherine Cooper as she speaks with Frank Perez, president of the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana. In this podcast they talk about the Project’s history and role in advocating for the preservation of queer history in Louisiana.

Catherine Cooper: Frank, I wanted to start with the question of what is the LGBT+ Archives Project, and how did it start?

Logo of the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana

Frank Perez: The LGBT Archives Project is a statewide collective, non-profit organization that works to promote the preservation of materials that chronicle queer history in Louisiana. A lot of people think that we are an archival repository, but we’re not. We basically reach out to the community and try to locate materials and say hey, if you’ve got anything that needs to be preserved, here are your options. So, we connect donors to institutions around the state. We have a very good collaborative relationship with museums, libraries, archival repositories throughout Louisiana, and we’ve been around about eight years.

We actually, when we talk about how we got started, about ten years ago, a local activist, who recently died, by the name of Stewart Butler, was 79 or 80 at that time, called together some people who are interested in local history, and pointed out the fact that he had a lot of material that he had saved from thirty, forty, years of activism and was worried about where it was going to go when he died, and pointed out that there were others in the same situation. And that kind of got the ball rolling amongst a group of people to figure out what can we do. Originally, two men by the name of Mark Gonzalez, who was a longtime activist, and Otis Fennell, who owned a gay bookstore here in New Orleans, decided that they would do oral histories and they were going to call it The Legacy Project. And they only did one interview, they interviewed Stewart, but the more they got into it, they realized they really didn’t have the expertise, the equipment, or the time to successfully do it. And The Legacy Project kind of fell by the wayside, but from its ashes grew the LGBT+ Archives Project.

Frank Perez

About a dozen of us met once a month at Stewart’s house, in 2012, trying to figure out what we could do. And we spent that year kind of surveying what was out there. So, we sent questionnaires and did site visits to universities, archives, libraries, private institutions, like the Historic New Orleans Collection, just everyplace we could think of to basically find out what was there. And our basic question was: Do you have LGBT material, and if you do what do you have, and do you want more? And if you don’t have any LGBT material, would you like some? We were delighted to discover that everybody we talked to was interested in acquiring this material.

So we, as a group of lay people, you know none of us had degrees in library sciences or archives or anything like that, we all had day jobs, we were all volunteers, decided that it would be wise not to try to reinvent the wheel, we didn’t have the money or the expertise to open up our own museum or archive. We concluded that the best thing we could do would be to raise awareness about the need for preserving these materials. So that’s how the LGBT+ Archives Project was born. I guess you would date it to 2012 – 13. So, we’ve been around seven, eight years.

Catherine Cooper: When you have people that come to you with these materials, what is your process for directing them or matching that collection to a repository? Is it geographically based?

Frank Perez: Ideally the best practice is to keep a collection close to the area that generated it, or in which it was generated. Ultimately, the decision of where a collection goes is up to the donor. We don’t recommend, we don’t endorse, we just kind of say this is what’s available. Now, the advice that we give and the options that we lay out for the donor depend on the nature of the collection. Collections can be quite varied. If it’s journals diaries, letters, minutes from meetings, any kind of paper documents, that’s going to want to go to an archive. That’s what an archive deals in, paper, rare primary source material. But if it is a three-dimensional object, say a gay carnival costume from a masquerade ball, well archives are not interested in three dimensional objects, that would have to go to a museum. So, it just kind of depends on the nature of the material itself.

Another concern is audio and digital files. Some institutions don’t have the money or the staff or the expertise to handle audio visual equipment or digital born materials, so that’s another factor. But to answer your question, it really depends on the nature of the materials.

Catherine Cooper: And are you actively trying to find these materials in Louisiana?

Recipients at the Gay Appreciation Awards

Frank Perez: Yes, there are a couple ways we do that. We are very fortunate in that the more our name gets out there and the more people become aware that we exist, people will actually contact us with everything from super huge collections to what is called ephemera, these are posters or programs from events. So sometimes people reach out to us and we’re happy to help them, but we also contact people that we know have big collections, and in addition to people, also organizations. So, any organization that is LGBT themed, should really consider designating some area repository as they’re official place to put their records. So organizational records are very important, that’s minutes from board meetings, that’s agendas, that’s posters, flyers, pamphlets, that sort of thing.

One of the ways that we do that, that we’ve found to be very successful, is through an annual event that we conduct called the Oracle Gala. It’s an annual gala fund-raising event. What we do at that is we honor a donor, whether it’s an individual or an organization, who has made a substantial donation of materials to an area institution. What that enables us to do is approach people and organizations and say, hey, if you donate your materials to A, B, or C, we can make you the honoree at our Oracle Gala. And that seems to have been an effective way of motivating people and organizations to donate their materials.

Barbershop quartet at the 2019 Oracle Gala.

Catherine Cooper: Would you say that has been one of your most successful avenues for engaging with communities? Are there other ways that you reach out?

Frank Perez: Oh, there are a lot of other ways that we do that. We do a number of programming events throughout the year. And these could be events like the Oracle Gala, I just told you about. We also do an annual membership meeting where we have a keynote speaker. But we also conduct workshops, social events, things like that throughout the year. We have done panel discussions on the history of the AIDS epidemic in New Orleans. We’ve done workshops on personal archiving at home, for hurricane season; we’ve done social mixers with other LGBT groups. So, we do a lot of different things that engage the community.

Catherine Cooper: So, looking through your website, you also have digital and digitized materials that are housed there. How do you decide what content to post?

Frank Perez: Well, if it’s available, we’ll post it.

Catherine Cooper: [Laugh].

Frank Perez: The problem is we’re an all-volunteer organization, and we all have day jobs, and we have no full-time paid employees. So sometimes we have a lot of stuff that needs to get uploaded, pictures and videos, and they’re just in a backlog, they’re in queue. So, to answer your question specifically, if it’s anything that has to do with LGBT history in Louisiana, we’re happy to post it.

Photo thumbnails from the Southern Decadence Gallery on the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana website.

But we do have a photo gallery of events and organizations and people, and we’ve got a tremendous backlog of photos that need to be processed and uploaded. If anybody would like to help us volunteer to scan pictures, or help with that, we could certainly put you to work with that. We are always expanding our bibliography which is online. We have a very extensive listing of materials that have been done, research that have been done, whether it’s magazine articles, doctoral dissertations, documentary films. We have specific bibliographies on HIV coverage in the newspapers in New Orleans in the eighties, transgender violence bibliography, so forth and so on. So, we’re always looking to expand that as well.

We’ve got a note on the bibliography that says, “If we’re missing anything that you know about, please let us know.” What that enables us to do is help researchers. So, in addition to facilitating donations to institutions, we’re also in a position to help researchers. We get contacted pretty regularly by graduate students, filmmakers, researchers, authors, whomever, wanting to know what’s available on a certain topic. We’re in a great position to say, if you’re interested in A, B, C here’s where you need to go, here’s where it is, here’s what’s available. So that saves researchers a lot of legwork and we’re happy to do that.

I should probably mention that we do have a pretty active oral history program. We collaborate with, we have a partnership with, the T. Harry Williams Center for Oral History at LSU, which is like one of the best in the country, to conduct oral interviews. These are audio, not visual interviews. We’ve done, I don’t know a little over half a dozen, maybe a dozen, interviews so far, and they’re currently in the process of being transcribed. They have to be transcribed and checked for accuracy before they can be uploaded. But we will eventually have that available on the website as well.

Catherine Cooper: Are there similar programs to the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana in other states?

Frank Perez: Yes, and no. The closest thing would be what’s called The Invisible Histories Project of which we are sort of a part, we collaborate with them. That is an organization that is working to preserve queer history throughout the southeastern United States from Texas to Georgia. They got started after we did, and they were pretty pleased to discover that we were already on our way here in Louisiana. They kind of do a state by state approach. They are based out of Alabama, but they have a great website, but we have collaborated with them on a number of projects. Throughout the country, especially in larger cities, like Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and others, there are archival repositories that deal with very specific LGBT materials, but what we do here, with the archives project in Louisiana is unique in that we don’t operate our own facility or repository.

Two people posing with a Gay Easter Parade poster.

Catherine Cooper: If people want to get involved, either with your project or with similar projects in other parts of the country, what would you recommend?

Frank Perez: I would recommend that they visit our website, and email us, and ask what’s available. Depending on what people’s talents and interests are, we can usually find something for them to do. We’re always looking for volunteers. People can follow us on Facebook, like our Facebook page, we have a pretty active social media presence. We are a 501-C-3 nonprofit, so we are always looking for financial support. People can donate on the website. So those are a couple of ways.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Catherine Cooper speaks with Frank Perez, president of the LGBT+ Archives Project of Louisiana. In this podcast they talk about the Project's history and role in advocating for the preservation of queer history in Louisiana.

March 27, 2020

95. Looking at a Career with Master Mason Dom DuRubis (Episode 95)

Transcript

Dom DeRubis teaching at a PTN event at HPTC.

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Services National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join Jason Church as he speaks with Dominic DeRubis, historic preservation mason at HPTC. In this podcast they talk about Dom’s career with the National Park Service and how he originally joined up with Williamsport Preservation Training Center.

Jason Church: Dom, you are well known as a red mason and instructor. When and how did you get into this?

Dom DeRubis: My dad was very big on education because he only had one year in Italy. So he wanted us all in the family to go to college and he was a coal miner it was very hard to go and have finances. My brother went, he became a superintendent of a school district; my sister went, she’s a head nurse. I come along, I like to work with my hands.

My uncle comes over from Italy with a stone trade. My dad said to me, “If you’re not going to college,” I was sixteen years old, “Go up there and see your uncle, he’s going to teach you a trade that you’ll have for the rest of your life.” Since I liked working with my hands, I’ll do it at sixteen.

So, my uncle basically started me out as a mortar mixer, had my hand, and as I advanced, then they put the trowel in my hand. I spent five years, not three, five years as an apprentice because that’s how they did it in Italy. It was only a three-year program, but I had to take it five, that’s fine.

I went through the ranks. I worked my way up to his foreman and then basically he retires his business and he said, “You can take over the business.” I tried it. Things were bad at that time—these were the seventies, eighties. So, I’m teaching, in the meantime I took a night teaching job at the Votech teaching adults.

Well, I had a Park Service individual taking my adult class, and he said basically… From the Park, he said, “We’re looking for a mason.” And I’m looking for work at that time, it’s in the spring of the year and I said, “Boy, that’s good, I can do your work.” And he said, “Well you have to apply.”

Well, masons don’t apply. They just go and say “Are you hiring?” or “I’m a contractor.” I said, “Yeah, I’ll do your work, that’s fine.” And he said “No, no Dom, you’re going to have to apply.” I said, “I never applied for anything in my life, but I’ll fill out that application.” Very basic, I filled it out. And he says, “The cert is closing tomorrow, you have to hand carry this to our office at the Allegheny Portage National Historic Site.” I said, “I’ll do that; I want to do your work.”

So, in the meantime, it was WPTC from Williamsport in Maryland, they want to hire me. I said, “I’m willing to do your work.” But I’m thinking this is just a temporary hire, I just want to do the work. I’m now gathering up a whole lot of contracting work, too. And I took the interview with them and they said, “Well”—this was probably in April—and he says, “We’re not hiring until July.” And I said, “Hey, listen buddy, I can’t wait until July. I have to have enough work in the summer to get me through the hard winter.” I said, “I have to take all the work I can, can you give me anything at all?” He said, “No, I can’t.” And I was going out the door and he basically said, “Keep this date open” July 27th or something. And I said, boy, that’s a pretty strong indication he’s going to give me the job, but I… still, me and my partner, we’re working.

So he called, and he called my ex-wife and he said, “Do you think your husband would like to have that job?” And she said, “I’ll ask him, he’s really busy.” And she said, “He called, and they want to hire you.” And I said, “I think I’m going to take a shot at it. Maybe there’s some future in this Park Service work for me.” So I went to Johnstown. We worked there and I did the stone work.

Dale Lupton and Dom teaching a class on masonry tools at a IPTW conference in Frederick, MD.

What happened was WPTC had a building in Richmond, Virginia and it was a butter brick job. Butter brick went out in the 1800s. Mr. Hicks, who was the superintendent at that time, he came up to see me and he says, “Dom, I know you’re a good mason.” He says, “Can you do butter brick?” I says, “Yeah I can do them.” He says, “Who taught you?” I said, “My uncle. He come over from Italy and we put an addition on a courthouse, it’s butter brick and we had to match it. And he taught me.” He said, “I need you in Richmond.”

Now, I’m a local boy that doesn’t like to drive in a small town. I said, “I’m not going to Richmond.” I said, “No, you hired me for Johnstown. This is where I want to work and when I’m done here, lay me off. I have a business going on the side, now, with my partner.”

He comes back up and he says, “Listen.” I said, “You can’t make me go to Virginia. I was hired as local help. I know you can’t make me do this. I can quit and go, my business needs it.” “I just want to talk to you.” And he says, “I can’t find anybody in the United States or any contractor that can do butter brick. And you’re the only I guy I know, can you help me out?” I’m pretty easy going and I says, “I only have one old clunker truck and I have a family car.” He said, “We’re going to give you a vehicle to use and I’m going to pay you overtime to drive from your house to Maryland.” And he said, “I’ll give you all the overtime you want.” He basically said to me, “We need you to do this brick front.” I looked at it and I said, “Yeah, I’ll do that in about two weeks.” And I got it done, a couple of arches and the brick front and they liked it, the butter brick and I said, “That’s fine, now I’m done with this traveling stuff.” I said, “I don’t want to travel but I’ll finish your job in Johnstown.”

So he comes back up, and now in the meantime, I’m teaching at the Votech at night. I took and got certified to teach in the daytime and they’re going to move me up as a full-time instructor at the Votech. And I have the job nailed down.

Dom DuRubis mixing quick lime.

Mr. Hicks comes to see me and he says, “I need you to do another butter brick job in Richmond around a two story building.” Now I’m going to Votech now. I said, “We’re done here, lay me off, I’m going to Votech.” He said, “We’ll talk about it.” I said okay. He said, “Listen, I’m closing it and putting in heat in December. You’ll be nice and warm. Where are you going to work in December, nowhere.” I said, “I understand that.” He said, “Can you just come down and do the two-story building?” He said, “I’ll provide you with a driver.” I said, “Wow, that’s pretty awesome.” I said, “Yeah, I need the money before Christmas” and he said, “All the overtime you want.”

So, I did the two-story building. It’s Christmas party and Mr. Askins, who started HPTC or WPTC, he came to talk to me and he said, “This organization really needs a mason. We’re really hurting for a really good mason,” and he said, “You fit the category very well. Would you work here?” And I said, “I don’t think so. I don’t like to travel, I don’t even like to drive and you’re a hundred miles away from me.” Basically, they pull me in the room and they said, “It’s winter time, you’re not working out there. I know you’re off. You’re not working. We’ll provide you with work and we have a driver and a car for you through the winter.”

I go through the winter. They’re getting more work for me and I’m saying, “Lay me off because I’m going to Votech in the Fall.” Mr. Hicks said, “Let me talk to you.” He said, “Bring their package down, what they’re paying you and your benefits. How much do I have to beat it to get you to work for us?” I said, “It’s going to take quite a bit because I’m going to be leaving home and traveling.” Now I said, “If you can beat the package by ten thousand dollars a year,” I said, “I’m willing to talk to you about it.” So he said, “Okay, I think I can do that, because I don’t have masons.”

He talked to whoever he had to talk to in DC, and he came to me on a Monday morning and he said, “Fill out the application,” and I did. And he said, “You’re the best qualified, you’re going to get the job.” He said, “Actually, I’m going to give you fifteen thousand dollars more.” This is in ’89, you’re talking about a good raise. He said, “I’m going to give you a work leader and I’m going to step you out which takes ten years to step out in the Park Service. I’m stepping you up right to step 5 to get you the money you want.” So, I said, “I’ve got to go home and talk to Votech, my wife, kids, see what we come up with.”

Dom DuRubis patching a marble tablet.

Now, I was certified to teach but I didn’t have all my credits. I had sixty credits that they gave me for my knowledge of masonry. But I had to go back to college and I had to take General Ed, Psychology, Math. I’m not a student type person, I’m a hands-on person. And I talked to my wife and I said, “Maybe you could help me through college and I’ll take the job with Votech.” She said, “No, you have to do this on your own.” I said, “Well, I’m not going to school. I never liked school, I’m a hands-on person. I’m going to go down there and do hands-on work that I know how to do. I know I can instruct, but I don’t know about this college.” I said, “I’ll go down and talk to the superintendent, Mr. Hicks.” I said, “I’m going to take the job,” and he said, “That’s good.” Then I said to him, “Remember one thing, I worked for my uncle for twenty-eight years, I never quit. You provide me with work, I’m going to be here every day before anybody will be here, and I will never take sick time off.” He said, “Wow, that’s quite the dedication.” I said, “I’m very dedicated and I like my work.” And I said, “I’ll prove it to you.”

He gave me the first job and he said, “You have three weeks to lay these bricks at Thomas Stone in Maryland, 500 hundred bricks.” I was laying 800 in a day and he gave me three weeks. I went down there and I did it the first day. I went back and he said, “How’s it doing down there,” and I said, “I’m helping the carpenters. I did that in one day.” He said, “You couldn’t have.” I said, “Well you didn’t even have a lot of work there.” He said, “You got it all done in one day,” he said, “I’ll kiss your feet if you did that.” And I said, “Don’t say that, because it is done.”

He said, “You know that was kind of new work, we’re going to get into historic preservation, where it’s a lot slower.” I said, “I do preservation work. I restored churches, steeples, tore them down piece by piece, put them back together.” And he said, “And you’re a teacher?” I said, “Yes.” And he said, “We’re a training organization, can you teach masonry?” I said, “Absolutely, I can,” and that’s how my whole career started. I fell in love with historic preservation.

I retired and gave a whole year of sick time back to the government. And I still come back at seventy-seven and that’s my whole career.

Jason Church: What’s your favorite project you ever worked on?

Dom DeRubis demonstrating brick laying at an NCPTT training.

Dom DeRubis: Wow, I worked at so many… My favorite project? There was one at Friendship Hill that was very, very challenging. Friendship Hill was the Albert Gallitin House, he was the second Secretary of the Treasury and it was around Pittsburgh overlooking the Monongahela River. And they had a gazebo, it was oval shaped. From one end to the other, it must have been sixty feet. And they had coal mined under it, and it was falling into the river. They wanted it moved. They wanted it the exact same height, facing the river exactly and they wanted it thirty feet back into the yard. Now you’re talking about a gazebo and it’s oval and I said basically to one of the architects, “Who is going to lay this out for me?” They said, “You’re going to lay it out.” I said, “I don’t know, you’re talking about moving every stone and making it the exact same height and it’s an oval.” I said, “This involves pouring a footing, a stem wall and then stonework and having it exactly the same, exactly square with the other gazebo.”

How am I going to get an oval moved? So I started thinking, I can’t tear that down yet. I’m going to use lines and I’m going to put batting boards the whole way around. I said, to move any building, you have to start with a square. I can’t bend lines in an oval. I have to put the oval in a square. So I took and I put my lines and I shot the height for my batter boards all the way around and I put nails in for height. Now I have the height over there, now I have to run lines from each end and through the middle to get it square, now I have it basically in the area. And I thought, that’s good, I know I’m going to have it square and the height. So I said I can start dismantling, but I want to get every stone exactly right, every stone, even the small ones. How do you do that? I said, I know how to do it now. We’re going to reverse lay the whole thing. And I told the guys, “When you pick up that stone, don’t turn it walking over to me and I reverse build this on plywood in the yard. And we moved it. I was off a half inch, in that whole move in the inside paver, one half inch.

I think that was maybe my favorite, maybe my hardest project with the Park Service. I liked the challenge.

Dom removing old mortar during a gravestone restoration.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Jason Church speaks with Dominic DeRubis, historic preservation mason at HPTC. In this podcast they talk about Dom‰s career with the National Park Service and how he originally joined up with Williamsport Preservation Training Center.

February 19, 2020

94. Documenting Slave Structures and Tenant Cabins (Episode 94)

Transcript

Jason Church setting up laser scanner at Magnolia Plantation.

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Services National Center for Preservation Technology and Planning. Today we join Catherine Cooper as she speaks with Jason Church, Chief of Technical Services at NCPTT. In this podcast they talk about his new project scanning and documenting slave and tenant cabins across the United States before this vernacular architectural form disappears.

Catherine Cooper: This is Catherine Cooper. I’m here with Jason Church, Chief of Technical Services at NCPTT. Jason, it sounds like you’ve got a very ambitious new project. Would you like to tell us about it?

Jason Church:Thanks for sitting down and talking with me today, Dr. Cooper. Yes, we have a very different project than what NCPTT has done in the past. Most of my work has been cemetery related or research and materials. And we started a documentation project. We started it this summer. We had two US ICMOS interns, Ina Sthapit and Sukrit Sen and myself, worked for 10 weeks here in Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana along the Cane River, and we documented existing slave dwellings and tenant cabins. So we were able to document nine standing structures that, most of them, not all, but most of them were constructed and were used as slave cabins before the tenant farming systems started, and then they were occupied most of the time by the same families or descendants of the same families really until the late 1960s, is sort of this different labor field.

And for those who don’t know what tenant farming is, and that’s one of the big parts of this project, is to bring awareness to the tenant farming system that existed all through the South. Even the mid-Atlantic States. When the civil war ended and slavery was abolished, we still had to have this large labor force in America to drive the economics and the agriculture that we had. And Hollywood and common mythology would lead us to believe that everyone sort of happily shook hands at the end and the slaves were freed, and that’s really not what happened. Realistically, what happened was most of the slaves, not all, but most of them, had nowhere to go. They had no skillset other than what they had learned to do and sort of were stuck in the same area. People generally didn’t just walk down the road and go to a big city and start all over again.

Most people stayed right where they were at and plantation owners took advantage of this by saying, “Well, you can do your same job, you can live in your same house, and I’ll pay you now.” But the reality of that economics was, “I’ll pay you for the same labor that you did as a slave, but however, now you have to pay me rent for the house that you live in. You have to pay me for the clothes you’re wearing, you have to pay me for the food you’re buying.” And that sort of started a new type of slavery, of economic slavery. So these people a lot of times were stuck on the same plantation in that they agreed it was: you work the fields, and you get a percent of the share at the end of the year. And a lot of times, you never quite made it…

Slave cabin along the Cane River in Natchitoches.

As one gentleman, who grew up as a sharecropper farmer told me that every year, he heard the same thing: “You’re one bale short this year. If you’d just made one more bale, you would’ve made money and been out of debt.” But the reality is, it never happened for most people. So you were constantly in debt, so you had to stay and work the same field, the same job for generations. And you owed money because you had to pay rent, you had to buy food, you had to buy clothes and cloth, but you also had to buy the seeds and the fertilizer and rent the mule to harvest and work your part of the farm or your share of it. And all of that would be deducted from what you were going to earn at the end of the year. And the reality for most people, and this wasn’t just an African American thing, there were lots of white sharecroppers and tenant farmers as well. But the reality is for most, if you had an illiterate workforce, who’s to say that you ever really kept track of how much you spent and how much you earned.

So this system lasted from the end of the Civil War, really up through the 1960s and late sixties even. And really what ended that system of tenant farming was that mechanized machinery for harvesting and planting became cheap enough to replace the workers, which were close to free anyway. So now it was cheaper for the farmer not to support this large labor force. And you might have 50 or 100 people working a single farm, you could go down to maybe three or four people and mechanized equipment. So the reality of that is in the late sixties and early seventies when everyone was essentially evicted, you got a mass migration a lot of times to cities, a lot of youth went into military at that point, Vietnam was happening. So it was an easy economic driver to leave. What happened then was if you don’t have this labor force, you don’t need the houses that they occupied. So a lot of tenant farmers and slave cabins were torn down in the sixties and seventies. And after that we’ve lost the majority of them, so a lot of them were purposely tore down then. But the reality is most have been demolition by neglect since then. So, we have very few of them left.

So we decided at NCPTT that this was a national needs sort of, we were losing this whole vernacular architecture style and this whole way of life is disappearing with these buildings. So we wanted to try to document what we can, what’s still standing, not only to preserve the architecture, which is what we do, but also preserve the memory of not only the enslaved but of the tenant farmers that work these fields and lived in these houses. So the project started when I moved to Natchitoches. I saw all these, I had no idea, just these very cute little vernacular structures that dotted the landscape going down Cane River.

Capturing an oral history with former sharecropper Elvin Shields.

And I noticed every year there were less and less of them. And I actually didn’t even know what they were. And I was fortunate enough to run into a gentleman Elvin Shields, who is a historian here a Natchitoches who explained he himself grew up at Oakland Plantation and was a tenant farmer until he went off to Vietnam. And he sort of explained the story to me and brought my awareness to not only the structures but that way of life. And Mr. Shields estimated that there were around 800 of these houses just along the Cane River, what we call Downriver, so in that area. And right now there’s about two dozen left. With more and half of those being owned by the National Park Service. So we know those are protected. Park service owns them, they’re maintaining them, they’re preserving them. So we’re very worried about the other ones. So we started this project to sort of document them while we could and for the documentation for right now what we’re doing is using a FARO laser scanner to do 3D models of the interior and exterior of the houses.

And it really is a race against time. One of the houses that we scan… And unfortunately we didn’t get a very good scan because it was so overgrown. We scanned it on a Tuesday, we were told on Thursday it collapsed. And when it went, it didn’t just quietly fell over. As it leaned enough, the wall exploded. We had wood 20 feet out into the yard splintered. So these things, when they go, they go. And we were able to capture that in a 3D scan. It would’ve been nice to have gotten a better capture. We were not able to capture the inside of it because it was just too unstable. And it was really heart wrenching when it went, when the walls came down to find out it was furnished. And to me it was really heart wrenching to see that kitchen table, this really rough hewn board table sitting in the kitchen… Just how many people ate at that? And how many stories, and… I could just picture people sitting around and enjoying life and talking and telling each other about their day and all of that is now gone.

That’s really why we’re trying to capture them as we can. We accomplish that. All the scans are on YouTube, on NCPTT’s YouTube page and our website, we were able to capture nine of the structures last summer. That’s sort of the beginning of it, is to capture those and mostly to be able to start telling the story of the tenant farmers through their architecture.

Catherine Cooper: So you said that this was the start of the project, what’s next for it?

Jason Church: So we really started the project to A: We had just gotten a laser scanner, we’d never used it for anything. That was our first project, and part of it was these are very simplistic, very small structures. So it was a perfect case study in simplicity for a laser scan. But we wanted to make sure that we could learn to use the equipment and accomplish something in our backyard that would make a difference. Once we had sort of gotten it down pat, we knew what we were doing. We want more, more, more.

Interior of cabin at Oakland Plantation.

We want more slave cabins, more tenant houses. We want to travel all over Louisiana, all over the South, the mid Atlantic. So right now what we’re looking for is literally, who has structures that are still standing? The more original, the better. Unoccupied is perfect, that way we can do the inside and outside. We have been contacted by other National Park units. We will be going in the fall to scan other National Park sites that have slave cabins. There are a couple of SHiPO agencies that have contacted us with slave cabins that we’re going to document. And that’ll be great, and I’m excited to capture ones that are Park Service and state owned, but those are also protected and they’re not going anywhere. The Park Services is not going to let any of their structures fall down and state agencies aren’t either. So one of the things we would really like to find are private homes. Ones that are owned by people who will give us permission to come and document them. And if they have the history behind them, even better.

So really what we’re looking for now is wanting people to contact us. We’re going to set up a website where people can email us and say, “Hey, we’ve got this structure we’d love for you to come,” to really anything. If your house museum has one, we’d love to know about it. If you are a private individual that still has them on their property, we would love to hear about it. We’re happy to cut away the brush, long as they stable enough for us to be able to set the laser inside it. We’re good. We did a lot of work with machetes and clippers this summer to sort of prepare the sites for scanning. We’re more than happy to do that, but just trying to find any and all of them. We’re really going to start scanning again in the fall. So basically what we’re doing right now is lining up permission and sites, trying to find ones in sort of clusters and areas that we could travel to.

Yeah, we’ve got some lined up in Florida right now, in Tennessee… Basically that’s what we’re doing right now is looking for more structures. And we’ve had a lot of people interested, Joseph McGill with the Slave Dwelling Project and I have talked, and one of the goals that we hope for the future is to partner with him as he goes around and does his amazing work. He sleeps and camps out in slave cabins. We’d like to travel with him and document those cabins. Just trying to get more and more to be able to start building a more holistic view of what the architecture was like and what the life was like of the tenant and slave communities. So not just here in our small community in that condition, but be able to expand through the U.S.

Catherine Cooper: How far flung do you see this project becoming?

Jason Church: Ideally, what we would like to do, sort of as part of phase two, is to be able to start a database that will list the location and of course the documentation of each of the structures. And not only that, but once the database is available to the public, we would love to crowd source it and find people, if you have historic photographs of tenant cabins or slave cabins and you know where those were taken, we could then enter those in the database as another way to document structures that are lost. So we don’t have to only document the structures that are still standing. It would be nice eventually to start being able to crowdsource that, and hear from people, and start the document ones that are already gone. And not only the buildings themselves, which is initially what drove us into this, but we’re really right now looking to collect more histories.

Now, I know realistically we’re late, and this would have been awesome 30 years ago. So really what we’re finding now are the children of tenant farmers. It would be awesome to still find tenant farmers who were still actively farming. Most of the people we found were young, maybe teens or preteens when their family quit tenant farming. And their stories are very valuable and amazing, we’re trying to document those. But yeah, definitely oral history is to go along with the structures cause that’s only half the story. I mean, the building is great, and as a preservation organization that’s what we do, but the social history is absolutely as important. So hearing from people, hearing their story, what it was like living there, what it was like living in that time period, in that community, growing up as a tenant farmer, is very important. So we’re looking right now for people who want to talk to us and tell us their story.

If we can line up people, we’ll physically do interviews as we travel, otherwise people can call us. We’ll talk to them that way. But trying to sort of piece that together into a database that we can do more of the YouTube videos like we’ve been doing, where we can talk about the social aspect in conjunction with the documentation of the building, historic photographs, any of that. We want it. We want to be able to really have a more holistic approach to what these structures look like, who lived in them, how they’re used, what the farming was like, really what everyday aspect of it was like. And eventually… So we’re doing the 3D modeling of the houses, we’d like to move into also doing blueprints and measured drawings from those 3D scans as sort of another way to preserve the structures.

Catherine Cooper: You mentioned that you are hoping to have a website up for people to be able to reach out and submit things. Before that becomes live, how can people reach you if they have photographs, or stories, or cabins, or houses that they’d like to bring to your attention?

Historic photo of tenant cabin along the Cane River.

Jason Church: That’s a great question. We have been posting things on our Facebook page here at the National Center for Preservation Technology and Training, people could comment on those posts. To go on our Facebook page and look and see some of the posts, there’ll be a post about this podcast, they shouldn’t post that we have made from some of the videos, you can comment on that, or you can email me directly, which is jason_church@contractor.nps.gov. We’re just happy to talk to people about the project. It’s something that we feel passionately about. We want to talk to people about it to try to capture more and more before they’re gone. Because were literally losing them every day.

And the thing I run up against the most is, I’ll talk to people who are really interested in it and they’ll go, “Oh this is a great idea.” And they’ll tell me where the cabin’s at and we’ll get there and we’ll find what was the cabin. I’d say half of the ones that we investigated were no longer standing. And I don’t mean it was leaning, we found a pile of lumber that we could tell it was a house, or maybe one wall is still standing. The floor’s there and the walls are laying out in the field. That’s what we’re finding more than actual standing cabins. So a lot of people have told us, “Oh I was just there. You can go document it.” And then you start discussing it with them, they go, “Well, I guess it was a few years ago that checked on it.” And the cabin’s gone.

And a lot of people I’ve talked to have said, “Well, if you had talked to me two years ago, we had half a dozen, but now we tore them all down.” So we’re realizing there’s fewer than we thought, which just speeds us up even more.

Catherine Cooper: Thank you so much for talking with us today about the project and where you’re hoping to go. I hope people reach out.

Jason Church: Definitely, and go check out our website, NCPTT.NPS.gov, and look up tenant cabin, or just tenant, and the post will come up and go check them out. Check out our videos on YouTube, check out our Facebook page, and by all means, if you have resources, contact us. We’d love to hear from you.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast, show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Catherine Cooper speaks with Jason Church, Chief of Technical Services at NCPTT. In this podcast they talk about his new project scanning and documenting slave and tenant cabins across the United States before this vernacular architectural form disappears.

January 27, 2020

93. The Caddos and Their Ancestors (Episode 93)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology podcast, the show that brings you the people and projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join NCPTT’s Jason Church as he speaks with archaeologist Jeff Girard. In this podcast, they talk about Girard’s book, The Caddos and Their Ancestors.

Jason Church: Now Jeff, I know you are the retired regional archaeologist, but we’re sitting here in your office where you’re at work, so how retired are you these days?

Jeff Girard: I’ve been working on a grant from the Cane River National Heritage Area in the past few years working on the collections of the Williamson Museum.

Jason Church: So, that’s the repository here at Northwestern [State University].

Jeff Girard: Right. It was started in the early 20th century by George Williamson, and it is continued today. And there’s collections from all over the state, mostly from Louisiana, but some from other states as well. We’re trying to organize the collections now. They’ve accumulated for many, many years. It’s never been put into an electronic database of any sort, and that’s what we’re trying to do.

Jason Church: So, how many objects do you think are at the Williamson?

Jeff Girard talks to a school group from a dig site.

Jeff Girard: I have no clue. It’s in the hundreds of thousands, certainly.

Jason Church: Yeah. So, I want to talk to you today. You have a new book out, The Caddos and Their Ancestors, and subtitle is Archaeology and the Native People of Northwest Louisiana, Where They Are and Their Place in History. So, tell us a little bit about how you started, why you did this book, what it meant to you.

Jeff Girard: Well, I think the overall point is to give folks some sort of notion of the immense amount of time that people have lived in Northwest Louisiana. Our historic records only go back a couple of centuries, but we have evidence of people here for the last 12 to 14,000 years. That, of course, we know most of that time through archaeological research, through the study of the objects, and the alterations to the landscape that people left in the past. It’s a different perspective on the past. We don’t have specific individuals or specific events that we know about so much, but it’s more looking at changes in people’s life ways through that immense amount of time.

I did retire 2015 as the regional archaeologist. I worked for 26 years in this area, so I have a lot of information, and I also did public programs and I had little PowerPoint presentations that I would do on various topics.Once I retired, I decided, well, I’ll try to put these together in some way. I didn’t want it just to go away, and I thought maybe I could do a website or something. So, I started to write little narratives linking the various talks that I did, and I realized, well, I might be able to make this into a book. I sort of wrote a few chapters and sent them to an editor at LSU Press, and they liked it and said, “Give us the rest of it,” and I did. So, that’s how it actually came about.

Jason Church: In the very beginning of the book, you use a really good analogy that I’ve never seen before about linking archaeology and objects to words on a page. Can you walk us through that analogy?

Jeff Girard: Yes. I’ve kind of thought that the point is to try to get people to realize that archaeology isn’t just collecting old objects randomly. People will bring things to me and say, “How old is this or what does this mean?” I say, “Well, I can’t really tell because the context is missing. I have to know something about how it was found and where it was found.” The analogy I use there is it’s like bringing individual words into somebody and asking what things mean, when it isn’t the words themselves so much, it’s how they’re put together in sentences, and how the sentences are put together in paragraphs that really provides meaning.

Jeff Girard at the Fish Hatchery Excavation

Jeff Girard: It’s the same in archaeology. We can’t just look at individual objects and interpret them so much as we know their physical relationship, how they were found together, how they were found on the landscape, and also, try to get people to realize when they’re collecting things out there that that’s important that you take that out of context. You take that object out of context. It’s like taking a word out of a paragraph, and you just have a jumble of things that don’t mean anything. So, it’s the organization of the objects that we find are as important as the objects themselves.

Jason Church: So, I noticed one of the themes that sort of runs throughout the book is that a lot of these major sites were found when the landowner tried to build or plow up a mound on their site. Is that still a current issue today?

Jeff Girard: Oh yes. Alterations to the landscape that are going on today are just incredible and have been, and so we lose a lot of the archaeological record of the past in that. Also, sometimes we find things that we wouldn’t ordinarily find. But it is an ongoing problem, and it’s something where we know that it’s a limited database that we have. So, we try to look at what we can because it’s going away. I think we’ve located most of the mounds. Some of them, the exceptions, might be places where they have been plowed down or eroded down, and there’s just a little remnant of them left, and those places we might find some interesting things that there once was a mound in a certain area, and we just got the lower portions of it left, and we might not be able to recognize that on the landscape. Some of the older mounds, we’ve traced the Caddo culture back about a thousand years, as I point out in the book. There’s some other mounds that tend to be located up in the uplands, up in the hills, and sometimes it’s hard to tell if something’s a natural rise or it’s a mound. It’s something that surprises us.

Jason Church: If I’m a landowner and I run across the remnants of one of these mounds, what is the best thing to do?

Jeff Girard: Contact somebody; hopefully the Louisiana Division of Archeology in Baton Rouge. We no longer have a regional archaeology program. I used to be the regional archaeologist, but that was cut out by budget cuts a number of years ago. The best thing is to be able to contact somebody. Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of archaeologists out there. It’s difficult, but the people at the State Exhibition Museum, the Bossier History Center, museums, and sometimes libraries and stuff have the contacts where they can get to somebody who may be able to evaluate it in some manner or another.

Jason Church: So would you recommend, take a few pictures, go talk to someone?

Jeff Girard: Yes. Take a few pictures. Send them to the Louisiana Division of Archaeology, Cultural Recreation and Tourism in Baton Rouge, and they’ll be happy to take a look at it.

Jason Church: As you go through the history, what are some of the major sites in the Caddo culture that have yielded the most information for us?

Jeff Girard: Well in this area, going back before the Caddo culture, the earliest one that has been a major importance is a site called the Conly site, and it’s in Bienville parish below Lake Bistineau. It is very interesting because of its unique preservation circumstances. It was a place along a loggy bayou that was buried under 12 to 15 feet of alluvial clays. So, things are preserved there that normally don’t get preserved such as animal bone and plant materials. We know in detail what these people were eating at that time. And at that time, it’s also very interesting because it dates about 7,500 years ago, and it is one of the earliest places that we have a major archeological site in Louisiana. There are also human burials at the Conly site, and they’re the earliest burials that we have in the state of Louisiana, and some of the earliest in the southeastern United States. That’s an incredible place. It gives us a look at a place very long ago, and gives us a look at it in very much detail that was just extraordinary. The preservation of bone was really good, and so we have deer bone, we have fish bone, even little fish and crawfish, and all kinds of things that got preserved underneath that clay. But, later on we have, as far as the Caddo sites themselves, we have places in north Caddo parish such as the Mounds Plantation site, which is still preserved very well. It’s on private property, but the landowner takes very good care of it. There are seven big mounds that were arranged around a plaza at Mounds Plantation. There are only two that are left that are of substantial size. Most of them are smaller or just been plowed down. But it is a site at the beginning of what we think of as the Caddo culture, and is some of the earliest Caddo pottery that we find.

In one of the mounds that was dug in the early sixties, there were burials in the bound of the leaders of the community, and they were buried with some extraordinary objects and beautiful pieces of pottery and other items that came from far away from other places. So, it’s a very interesting place. Contemporary with that, there was a place called the Gahagan site down in Red River Parish, and it’s been destroyed. The water washed it away in the 1940s, so it’s no longer there, but it also had a burial mound with extraordinary objects in it. Those are now at the Louisiana State Exhibition Museum in Shreveport. But, some of the items came from the Cahokia site in Illinois, which is across from St. Louis, which at that time, and we’re talking here about between about 1050 and 1200 A.D., it was an immense place. It was essentially a city and there was over a hundred mounds up there at Cahokia.

So, we have objects that came from there that made it all the way here into Louisiana, and they showed up at the Gahagan site, including objects of copper. Of course we don’t get copper around here naturally, but it came from where we got copper today in the Great Lakes region.

Jason Church: So, do you think the Caddo were traveling that far or were there trade routes between?

Girard taking core samples at Los Adaes.

Jeff Girard: I’m not sure so much it was trade as much as it might’ve been people just visiting up there, pilgrimages, because the objects themselves aren’t sort of commodities, everyday things that you would trade. They’re very special items and very sacred items and they wind up in the burials of the leaders of the communities. So, I think that it was more of a—if people knew about Cahokia, knew there was this incredible place up there. So, a lot of people traveled up there and brought back things that were of incredible interest.

Jason Church: Yeah. It would have been quite a pilgrimage at that time.

Jeff Girard: You have to travel across the Ouachita and Ozark mountains to get up into to that area now, so immense journey. Of course there’s no horses, no wheeled vehicles of any sort. People had to either travel by water, which would have been difficult across the mountains, obviously, or they had to walk.

Jason Church: So, when we get later into the Colonial period where you had Los Adaes and Fort Saint John Baptist here in Natchitoches, you paint sort of a dark picture of what become of the Caddo and the Natchitoches Indians. Can you talk a little bit about that time period?

Jeff Girard: Up until when the French first got here in 1699-1700 and then established Natchitoches here 1714, it was mostly a still Caddo area. I mean there was just a handful of European colonists and everybody else was Caddos, and they lived throughout the area. The Caddos continued to be dominant in this area throughout until about middle 18th century, the middle 1700s, and then with the Spanish period after the 1760s, things started to change a lot. One of the problems was disease, the demographics. The Caddos lost much more substantially in terms of the population and even though the disease affected the French folks as well, they could replace the populations because more and more Europeans were coming into the area. But there weren’t more and more Indians coming into the area. So, demographically, they started to lose out in terms of overall population levels. Also, they did become increasingly dependent on things such as firearms, gun powder, things they couldn’t replace. Instead of stone tools, it became iron tools. So, they had to trade and they were trading things like horses, livestock, cattle. They were stealing from folks in Texas and bringing it down here into the Natchitoches area, and eventually that was going down to New Orleans, and manufactured goods were coming up the other way. So, in the long run it was not good for the American Indian groups at all, and they became secondary when they were culturally dominant in the early 18th century.

The Europeans, the French, never enslaved the Caddos, I mean because they had trade relationship with the Caddos and the other groups. But what happened is really who bore the brunt of that was the Apaches; that there were the Comanches, Wichitas and Caddos were all taking Apache prisoners from Texas and bringing them into this area. Mostly, it isn’t like the African American slave trade where there was gang labor on plantations. It was mostly like women and children and things like that, a household of people. It was different than what we generally think of is as slave trade.

I tried to keep the book focused on archaeology and not try to write a history of the Caddos, because there’s been several others that are very good about Caddo history and go from the 18th century into the early 19th century. But one of the problems in the Colonial period is we don’t really have an archaeological site that we can say “This is where a group of Caddos lived in the 1700s,” so I do things like Los Adaes and I do things from Natchitoches here, and from a site up in De Soto parish that was actually lived in by a Frenchman named Pierre Robleau. He was married to a Native American wife, and they had trade connections because they were living amongst the Adaes, so one of the groups of the Caddos up there, but actually the archeological site that we have was a Frenchman. It wasn’t the Indians themselves.

Archaeology of a Caddo Site.

Jason Church: You mentioned that, archaeologically, that a lot of the Caddo pottery during this time period takes on European forms.

Jeff Girard: Yes.

Jason Church: Do you think that was out of ease of trade? It was easier to trade with the Europeans if they have the European forms?

Jeff Girard: Yes. I think there was a market and that’s what the European people wanted. It’s mostly very utilitarian sorts of things like pitchers, and big storage jars, cooking bowls and stuff that would be stonewares in European terms, but there just wasn’t a trade. They were hard to get, so it was easier to get the Indian pottery for that. The relationship between the Caddos and the French was one of trade and it was a very important relationship to both groups.

One of the things that people often ask about is what kind of houses did the Caddos live in and how do we know? The reason that we know is that the Caddos built houses that had posts in the ground. They put posts in the ground in a circular pattern and often times the posts, those houses, burned down and when they did, the posts leave a charcoal stain in the ground. So, if we excavate enough area, we can uncover the configuration of the house at its base.

As far as the upper part, we know from historic documents in the 18th century, mostly from missionaries in East Texas, what the upper part of the houses look like, and they were still making these in the 18th century, but they go way back probably a thousand years. They’re making cone shaped houses that are thatched with grasses. This style house goes way back and we can detect it through the archeological record. As far as their economy, certainly beginning in the 10th or 11th century, we have evidence they started to grow corn and a little bit of beans and squash. They were doing probably some gardening of other plants even farther back in time than that. These plants would have been oily and starchy seed plants that were very nutritious such as sunflowers. We still eat amaranth, chenopodia, somethings that are weeds nowadays, but they do have seeds that you can eat and that are nutritious. But after about 1200 A.D., the Caddos were dependent on corn, on maize agriculture. That was very, very important to them. So, they were farming and living in settled villages. They also were continuing traditional food acquisition of hunting and mostly deer, but also small game rabbits and squirrels and things like that and fishing. Whenever we find a Caddo site where we have bone preserved, lots of fish bone. So, fish was very important in their diet.

Jason Church: You mention in the book a little bit about Clarence Webb.

Jeff Girard: Yes.

Jason Church: Tell us a little bit about Clarence Webb, who he was and what his contribution was.

Jeff Girard: Clarence Webb was a pediatrician in Shreveport, and he got interested, way back in the 1930s, in archaeology. I think one of his sons was a boy scout at the time, so he worked with his son. He dug some very important archaeological sites. He was one of the first to look at places where nobody else was doing it at the time, one of which is the Gahagan site back in the 1930s before that site was destroyed, that he’s the one who excavated in there.

He excavated at a site called Belcher up there north Caddo parish that I’ve described in some detail in the book because is it very important. It’s a later Caddo site. It’s between about 1500 and 1700 A.D. He also worked at the famous Poverty Point site in northeast Louisiana, which is now a world heritage area site.

Dr. Webb had sort of two careers. I mean he was recognized by professional archaeologists as one of the pioneers of the field. In fact, he formulated some of the pottery types that we now use all the time, and some of the way we put the archaeological record together, the systematics that we use for this area. It was Dr. Webb who first formulated that in conjunction with working with other professional archaeologists,

Jason Church: But he maintained his pediatric career.

Jeff Girard: Yes, yes he did and he was very well known. In fact, I think he was President of the American Pediatric Society at one time, so he had a very successful career in the medical field as well. I can’t remember when he died, but it was the early 1990s [1991], and he worked right up to that time. He donated his collections, his research collections, to Northwestern State University and we have them here, and that’s one of the things I’m helping catalog. Also, some of his libraries and his correspondence are in the archives here at Northwestern.

Jason Church: You were able to work with him.

Archaeology of a Caddo Site.

Jeff Girard: I came here in 1989 and the first few years I was here, he was still alive and I was working with him a little bit as he got his books together and his papers together, and I would go up to Shreveport and meet with him and turn over things that he had organized. He was wanting to have things very well organized before he donated them.

Jason Church: Well, Jeff, thank you so much for talking with us today and telling our listeners a little bit about your new book from the LSU Press, The Caddos and Their Ancestors. We really appreciate it, and I highly recommended if you’re interested at all in not only just archaeology in general, but the history of Native Americans and especially the original occupants of Louisiana.

Jeff Girard: Right. Thank you very much.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

The Caddos and Their Ancestors Archaeology and the Native People of Northwest Louisiana, Where They Are and Their Place in History: "Our historic records only go back a couple of centuries, but we have evidence of people here for the last 12 to 14,000 years. That, of course, we know most of that time through archaeological research, through the study of the objects, and the alterations to the landscape that people left in the past. It's a different perspective on the past.

January 15, 2020

92. Creating Coast Salish Imprints-The Public Art of Susan Point (Episode 92)

Transcript

Kevin Ammons: Welcome to the Preservation Technology Podcast, the show that brings you the people in projects that are bringing innovation to preservation. I’m Kevin Ammons with the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training. Today we join Catherine Cooper as she speaks with Robert Watt, author of “People Among the People: The Public Art of Susan Point”. In this podcast they talk about his new book, and the importance of Dr. Point’s art in the revitalization of Coast Salish art forms.

Susan Point carving the large spindle whorl “Good Luck”. Jeff Cannell, courtesy of Archives of Coast Salish Arts

Robert Watt: My first hope was to produce a book that would be a celebration of the public work of a very great artist. I said several years ago, if we were in Japan, Susan Point would be termed a national treasure. And that’s how I think of her. And so doing this book, I think gives many more people that chance to appreciate the dramatic scale of her accomplishments. I think it also helps to ensure something that is so important to her and that is the business of a Coast Salish aesthetic and cultural imprint in this part of the world.

House posts in the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia. Jeff Cannell, courtesy of Archives of Coast Salish Arts.

I quite often meet people who, if the discussion turns to First Nations art they immediately talk about totem poles. Well, totem poles were never part of Coast Salish culture. Carved house posts—typically more internal elements in a big house than external elements—but certainly totem poles were not a part. And the styling of Coast Salish pieces is very distinctive. And my hope is that people who have a chance to read this will come away with that understanding. They will understand that the people here, the First Nations here, had their own aesthetic, their own style. I think through her art, Susan has succeeded in achieving that.

Catherine Cooper: The spindle whorl seems to be a very important motif. Could you tell us a bit about why?

Robert Watt: I think that’s a question maybe best answered by Susan herself. Early in her researches she discovered and admired the historic spindle whorls in various museum collections and she was inspired by them. She created new designs using the form. And of course the circular form as you know for First Nations cultures, not only in this part of the world but in many other parts of the world. The circle of life and the way it allows you to talk about the importance of four: four seasons, four elements, all those things.

Catherine Cooper: One of the things that sort of struck me with the number of materials she’s worked with is it’s always: if it’s new and she can learn, that also seems to be a bit of a theme.

“Salish Gifts” in cast concrete with bronze lids and set on colored stone. Kenji Nagai.

Robert Watt: Oh yes. Yeah. She’s been a pioneer in using so many different materials, far more materials I think than any other First Nations artist. Certainly in our area and perhaps right across Canada. I can’t bring to mind any other First Nations artists that has so dramatically and aggressively explored different media. One minute it’s metal and the next minute it’s cast concrete and the way that she locates associates and mentors to teach her new techniques and then also people that she can work with to bring her ideas fully to life.

So for example, the great stained glass window—art glass window in Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver involved a very close working relationship between a glass artisan, Yves Trudeau, and Susan, who did the design and adjusted the design. But at one point she went to Seattle with Yves Trudeau. When the design had been completed and accepted by the cathedral people she went to Seattle with Trudeau to work with the glass blowers and I think it was Fremont Glass in Seattle.

“Tree of Life” stained glass windows at Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver, BC. Kenji Nagai

And she was there for days with Trudeau, being involved with the process, watching the glassblowers produce the sheets of glass in a range of colors. That’s been part of, an element of, her career right from the start: working with skilled artisans, in various fields to enable her to produce something in a medium that she wouldn’t be able to do if she was working solely by herself. In that process of collaboration, she’s always front and center. She’s always watching and she knows how she wants something to look at the end. And she’s very patient and is always ready to go back at something to achieve a particular result. And she’s a real perfectionist and very meticulous. She doesn’t stop until she’s satisfied that no other result is going to be possible.

I think another part is, and this really struck me, was when she received a commission, one of the first things that she did was to take a very close look at where the work was going to be and what kind of relationship it might have with the building or the landscape that it was going to be part of. So her initial research was into the Coast Salish aesthetic. Later researches, piece by piece, were centered around the stories and the history of the places where the work was going to go.

Cover of the book, “People Among the People.”

So for example, the dust cover of the book shows the four corners piece, which is on the wall of one of the larger buildings at North Seattle College. And the coloring, and some of the framing elements in that design, relate directly to a stream and a particular red earth color that was important for the First Nations people who lived in that part of what is now North Seattle. And that sort of care and attention is very, very characteristic of all her work.

Catherine Cooper: So you’ve known Susan for many years and watched a lot of this work come about. Have you also seen a resurgence of Coast Salish art since she started?

Robert Watt: I’ve become aware of it and I remember being on Vancouver Island and visiting friends North of Victoria in Saanichton and I went to do some shopping at a small shopping center or mall, and there were some beautiful carved pieces forming part of the entrance way in one of the larger stores there. And I could see right away that they were Salish because I saw the elements that I had come to understand as Salish through Susan’s work. And then I found a label identifying them as the work of one of the Marston brothers; and the Marstons, and a number of other young artists, are now all working in using Salish aesthetics and so their work is quite distinctive. And I think Susan has been at the vanguard of a resurgence, or a Renaissance basically, in Coast Salish work.

Catherine Cooper: One of the other things that has seemed incredibly deliberate and important about the way you constructed the book is the inclusion of her native dialect.

Robert Watt: Yes. And that was a suggestion that was made to me by the main editor that I worked with: Mike Leyne of Figure 1. And it was wonderful to work with him. He’s a consummate professional and he made a number of suggestions to me too, that I think were particularly important in giving the book it’s final appearance and impact. And one was his suggestion to organize the pieces rather than chronologically, which was my thought as an historian, to organize it geographically beginning in effect on the Musqueam lands then going out from there in a series of circles. And taking this geographic look, almost like a giant spindle whorl in a way, reaching out from Musqueam to, in the end, places quite distant. But his other big suggestion was, he said, Is there not an opportunity here to introduce people to Halkomelem, the traditional language of the Musqueam, the downriver dialect?

Part of Susan Point’s work “People Among the People” in Stanley Park, Vancouver, BC. This is the Grandparents house post in the piece “Grandparents and Grandchildren”. Kenji Nagai, courtesy of Archives of Coast Salish Arts

And I thought it was a great idea. And he said, well, how can we do that? So I first discussed it with Susan, who was enthusiastic and then with… I was very, very fortunate to be able to enlist the help of elder Larry Grant of the Musqueam people, who is head of their language program. So Mike and I together settled on the words that we hoped to integrate into the text and then worked with elder Larry Grant to receive the correct Halkomelem word. And we also had similar help from Dr. Barbara Brotherton, who is the curator of Native American art at the Seattle Art Museum. And she was very, very helpful in, in effect, doing the matching sort of thing. But for the first peoples of what is now Washington state.

Catherine Cooper: And the pronunciation guide in the back is incredibly helpful.

Robert Watt: Yeah. And that was there with the approval and support of Larry Grant who got the agreement of the Musqueam people that it could appear there. Because it’s something created originally for the language program at Musqueam and in effect directly borrowed from their printed resources.

Catherine Cooper: Do you view this book as an effort at preservation and education?

“Aerial Hunter” bus shelter design in Seattle. Courtesy of King County Metro Transit Archives.

Robert Watt: Yes. A very good question. And yes, I do. Maybe one way of underlining that is, delightfully, Susan’s work as an artist continues and as we speak, she is working on a number of large new commissions. And so the book is a portrait in time. It begins, the earliest work is 1981-82 and the most recent is 2017. And as the decades unfold, it may will be that one or two of the pieces succumb to the elements. Nobody wants that to happen, obviously, beginning with Susan, but you know, she’s nothing if not a realist.

So as you see with the bus shelter piece in Seattle, that’s the one in the book that no longer can be seen because it was painted on plywood and it inevitably, because it was open to all the winds that blow in downtown Seattle and the rains that fall, and the sun beats down, it ultimately had to be retired. I think the book is a very important record of really, really important work by a very great artist.

Kevin Ammons: Thank you for listening to today’s show. If you would like more information, check out our podcast show notes at www.ncptt.nps.gov. Until next time, goodbye everybody.

Catherine Cooper speaks with Robert Watt, author of â€ŽPeople Among the People: The Public Art of Susan Pointâ€,. In this podcast they talk about his new book, and the importance of Dr. Pointâ€,s art in the revitalization of Coast Salish art forms

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