These two weeks of my internship have been extremely educational. Ashley showed me how to navigate Past Perfect and I have started with newspapers from the 19th century. I got to measure the newspapers and type up their locations, condition reports, and other various information. After I usually do a couple of the maps we begin on inventory again, this week I got to see a few interesting objects. For example, I saw a young boy’s bathing suit from the 1920’s, I was shocked to learn that most of the bathing suits from this time period were made from wool, I do not see how that was comfortable. Another fascinating clothing item I saw was a woman’s cape from 1861. Attached to the cape was a tag, it was not the original tag but it did say that this cape was $30 in confederate money. I found a money converter website online called, http://www.in2013dollars.com/ and I’m sure there was a difference in inflation from a U.S. dollar and a Confederate Dollar but $30 in U.S. money in 1861 would be equal to $773.90 in U.S. dollars now. This cape was very fancy and looked like it would be very expensive, also had been kept in fantastic condition.
A couple days after I came across the cape, I found a folder that contained Confederate money, bonds, and coupons. This was something that I could not pass up on to take a photo of. I found this to be ironic since I found the tag about the cape.
A few other things I found were about Roanoke College, one day when I was going through the maps to be entered into Past Perfect, I came across a magazine that was in pretty bad shape, there was no issuing date on there but on one page it mentions Roanoke College. It is just a brief three paragraph article that talks the beginning of the College and then about the accomplishments that the College is known for. From looking at the article’s pictures the magazine might be from the 50’s or 60’s.
Today, while I was searching through a donation I found a book called, The First Hundred Years Roanoke College 1842-1942, by William Edward Esienberg. I did not get the chance to look through the book since I found it three minutes before it was my time to leave. It just find it ironic that I keep on finding objects that correlate to each other days apart, it’s really interesting.
Ashley explained briefly that next week I will be doing something different, something with the actual exhibits at the Link location. I’m excited to see what is in store for me!