tehofmann

Who knew Museum work could be fun? Engaging and entertaining days have been a staple of my time at the Salem Museum. With a friendly staff and a young internship coordinator, the Salem Museum knows how to make history fun and accessible, especially for its interns. While designing exhibits, researching, writing signs, and even accessioning artifacts, I often find myself laughing and making jokes along with my coworkers. Whether it be about the struggles of the editing tag-team of Kerstan and myself, or the stories we make up about some exhibits, we’re constantly finding ways to keep ourselves entertained and engaged in our work. The joviality of the Salem Museum is best described by the newly opened holiday toys exhibit. Throughout the Museum, we’ve set up a series of encased and interactive holiday toys for our guests to enjoy. The featured exhibit in this series is a model train/village display. After playing with an assortment of dolls, civil war figurines, and a frequently “quality-tested” game of arcade baseball, guests can make their way upstairs to the model train. Though they may be startled it’s motion-sense activation, all will love watching the train pass through a model of Salem, complete with its own Roanoke College! For a little extra fun, we made up stories for many of the figures in the display…and we encourage our guests to do the same! In all, the Salem Museum has done a perfect job of making history entertaining and engaging for all who visit.

 

Quality control testing of a civil war (feudal?) era sword.

The 18th annual Ghost Walk came and went, and I could not have enjoyed it more. As I mentioned in my last post, I was slated to portray Charlie Hammit, Salem’s very own silent film star. After donning my western garb (complete with cowboy hat and fake “copperhead” snake around my neck), I set up shop in East Hill cemetery and awaited the first tour group. Taking a bit of artistic license with my character, I decided to portray Mr. Hammit as a true product of the theatre, over-dramatizing my lines and injecting a lot of energy, and a bit of self aggrandizement, into the character. From what I gathered, the audience enjoyed the burst of energy near the end of the tour and I was, apparently, quite popular with the middle school girls throughout the weekend…so big ego boost for me.

 

Now that both Ghost Walks have concluded, including the one at Sherwood that followed East Hill’s, my internship has shifted gears a bit. With most of the public history events in the rear view mirror, I’ve begun to do more historical research for various exhibits and lectures. Next, I will get to design my own exhibit, which I plan on featuring the political dynamics behind Salem’s midnight transition from a town to a city.

 

My first few weeks as an intern at the Salem Museum have been very enjoyable. I was fortunate enough to begin my internship just before a number of big events and was thrust right into the middle of museum work. After an in depth tour of the museum, I spent my first two weeks helping with setup and final research for the Roanoke College 175th anniversary exhibit. For this, I got to help design a display case (seen below), conducted some interesting research on the yearbooks of Roanoke College, and worked on the broad setup of the exhibit. Once the 175th exhibit was completed, we jumped right into planning and setting up for the Appalachian festival. In this capacity, I mostly worked doing room setup, though the little bit of advisory event planning I was able to do was a treat. Finally, after the Appalachian festival came and went, I began preparing for the Ghost Walk. This year, I’ll have the pleasure of portraying Charlie Hammit, a Salem native and a little-known star of The Copperhead Serials, a silent film series. I’m very excited to participate in the staple of Salem life and it’s been enriching to research and study the life of Charlie Hammit.