Over the past couple of weeks I have continued my usual accessioning work at the museum. I have also begun to work on a small project inside the museum. I have had a lot of fun so far interning at the Bowman Museum this summer and I hope to continue to learn more as my internship winds down.
I still find the work that I am doing to be very interesting and fun! As I am digging through forgotten boxes of collections items, I often come across interesting objects and occasionally these objects require some research or I get to play around with them and see how they work (or if they still work). The best example of this so far happened last week. Some volunteers and I found an old train set, which had a Caboose and an Engine modeled after a Prineville Railway train. So we spent 2 hours assembling the metal tracks and getting the train cars put together. However, we discovered that the Engine to the train (which had the transformer to make it run in it) was on display so we are still unsure if it still runs like it was made to. Nevertheless, it was a lot of fun getting to play around with the train set.
I definitely feel like I am making a contribution to the museum. I have contributed by working on boxes and projects that needed to be done, some were difficult, some were pretty easy. Throughout the summer I have gotten a lot done in the museum and I have learned quite a bit about collections care and management in a museum. I have not only learned about the Bowman Museum, but I have also learned a little bit about museums across the country and I had a lot of fun doing it.
Since I have mostly finished going through old accession boxes, I have begun a new project. One of the collection storage spaces in the museum is oddly shaped and the storage process of items in this space was not originally planned out very well. So over the past week, and the continuing weeks, I have been working on re-organizing this space to make it a little more functional so that it will be easier to get objects out in the future. It is a long process since I am also working on re-labeling the boxes that I and moving and updating their locations in the files. Being able to evaluate and organize a collections storage space is an important skill to have when working with museum collections and I am glad that I have opportunity to learn this skill.
I am learning many skills that I will be able to apply to future jobs, and I hope that I might be able to apply these skills in the classroom as well. I have really enjoyed my internship so far and I will miss working the museum when my internship ends.
Photos of the train set, updating the labels on the boxes, and the space that I am reorganizing.