Suitable Conservation of Iron

I don't give two craps what you plan to do with the big rusty iron thing you found and want to keep. I don't care if you plan to leave it outside in the snow and ice, Rustoleum paint is not a suitable conservation treatment.

Yes, I understand it doesn't come off. That is, exactly, my point.

*headdesk*

The Persistence of Memory

The Persistence of Memory, by Salvador Dali. Original at the Museum of Modern Art, NYC

I was just up in the Finger Lakes region again; I seem to be on some sort of quarterly schedule to get up that way. While up there this time, I stopped in Seneca Falls at the Women's Rights National Historical Park, part of the National Park Service (NPS). Work on the rehabilitation of the Wesleyan Chapel, where the first U.S. Women's Rights Convention was held in 1848, is finally underway.

Wesleyan Chapel, undergoing reconstruction. March 18, 2010.

What struck me about this site is the persistence of memory. That this location, in a small town in Upstate New York, has been remembered as the location of Something Important, even though the physical place was almost entirely obliterated.

The Wesleyan Chapel was built in 1843. It went up very quickly; those Wesleyan Methodists didn't waste time on anything. They split from the main body of the Methodist Episcopal Church over irreconcilable differences regarding the abolition of slavery, holding their first formal meeting in February of 1843 in Andover, Massachusetts (Brown 1987; Weber 1985). In March of that same year, the First Wesleyan Methodist Society of Seneca Falls was formally organized; in May they bought a vacant lot; by July construction of the church was underway; and on October 14, 1843, the church was dedicated (Brown 1987). The original structure measured 64 feet by 44 feet, and was built of local brick. A second floor balcony ran around three sides of the interior.

As well as a location for regular services, the church was also the location for several lectures and meetings, ranging from philosophy to politics, abolition, and temperance. The church was made available to these speakers free of charge (Brown 1987; Weber 1985). It was not at all a strange choice of location, therefore, for the first U.S. Women's Rights Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Martha Wright, Mary Ann M'Clintock, and Jane Hunt.

Approximately 300 people attended the two-day convention on July 19 and 20, 1848. Sixty-eight women signed the resulting Declaration of Sentiments; 32 men, including Frederick Douglass, signed their names in support of the women. I was doing the math while I was up there; it would be only barely possible to jam 300 people into the building, assuming each person only required nine square feet (3x3); certainly not everyone would have been in simultaneous attendance, but I can imagine people were also congregating outside the church, conversing and debating along the streets and on the adjacent open lawn.

In 1872, the Wesleyans of Seneca Falls moved to a new church. Their old, 1843 church was sold, and renovated to serve as an entertainment venue, as well as having storefronts along Fall Street. Subsequent owners renovated the building for use as an Opera House, a movie theatre, automobile showroom and repair garage (complete with a ramp to drive vehicles up to the second floor), fire hall, apartment building, and (ironically) a laundromat (Brown 1987). The structure of the Chapel had been virtually obliterated; no one looking at the building, even in the late nineteenth century, would see a church.

The Wesleyan Chapel from 1962-1985. It's in there, really! Image from the Women's Rights NHP website.

In 1932, a commemorative sign was placed by the New York State Education Department at the corner of Fall and Mynderse Streets, reading "First Convention for Woman's Rights Was Held On This Corner in 1848" (you can just make it out in the photo, above). Though this could be read that women met on the corner, as though it was a street protest, it underscores how GONE the chapel was. The sign doesn't commemorate their meeting in the building at the corner (in 1932, it was a car dealership and garage), but at the corner. Despite the disappearance of the chapel, women continued to remember this as the location of the Convention, and continued to meet at the corner, often trying to meet within the building. Some owners let them in; others, including one of the dealership owners, refused.

In 1985, the National Park Service purchased the property (then an apartment complex and laudromat). A national design competition was run to determine how to develop the new park. The winning design included the removal of all building and structural elements not associated with the 1843 church, with a few elements added to keep it standing. The result was essentially a standing ruin.

The Wesleyan Chapel in 2007. Image from the Women's Rights NHP website.

The lighter brick and steel roof are modern materials to keep the structure standing. The darker bricks are original to the 1843 chapel; portions of the original roof and wall plaster are on the interior. Original portions of the foundation survive below grade.

In order to address conservation issues associated with making the former interior of the Wesleyan Chapel exposed to the exterior elements, with vandalism, and with confusion on the part of visitors regarding what they were looking at, the NPS is rehabilitating the Chapel. Using what is known, the Wesleyan Chapel is being reconstructed, incorporating surviving elements, on its original foundations (Orcutt et al 2007).

An artist's rendering of the completed reconstruction of the Wesleyan Chapel. The red brick is original to the 1843 structure; you will be able to tell on sight which are original and which are reconstructed elements. Image from the Women's Rights NHP Website.

The result will be much more legible as the Wesleyan Chapel. But I wonder about this reconstruction. The persistence of the memory of the convention makes it clear that it is not the building that is important, but the place. And I am generally troubled by the sterility of historic reconstructions and many living history museums; they feel like just-so stories. What I hope is that the NPS utilizes the space within the new Chapel building for meetings, conferences, lectures, and other programs associated with women's history, women's rights, and women's experiences. It would be totally consistent with the Wesleyan's use of the building, and would do ongoing honor to those 100 who spoke up in 1848.


Sources:

Brown, Sharon A. (1987) Historic Structure Report, Historical Data Section, Wesleyan Chapel, Women's Rights National Historical Park, New York. NPS.

Orcutt, Tina, Jennifer McConaghie, Cheryl Sams O'Neill, Christopher Tavner, and Mark Warner (2007) Women's Rights National Historical Park - Wesleyan Chapel, Seneca Falls, New York: Rehabilitation and Preservation of the Wesleyan Chapel Environmental Assessment / Assessment of Effect. NPS.

Weber, Sandra S. (1985) Special History Study, Women's Rights National Historical Park, Seneca Falls, New York. NPS.

Musing on Paper Archives

I've often argued that microfilm is better for long-term preservation than digital. Sure, they're not searchable (though I have no issues digitizing and searchabilifying microfilm), but the information is always available. If your digital file gets corrupted, or you forget to back it up, or forget to save it onto whatever the new storage media is, or the world ends*, your information is GONE. With microfilm, all you need is a magnifying glass and a light source to get at the information.

I do have to admit, however, that I wouldn't want to roast marshmallows over microfilm. If nothing else, this should be a good reason to keep paper libraries.

* I don't actually believe we are in the throes of the apocalypse, but you know, stuff happens.

The Perfect Storm: Stimulus Money and Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation has mobilized to address issues of historic preservation in light of both the economic downturn and the availability of stimulus money. They're calling it The Perfect Storm.

The perfect storm is created when a flood of new stimulus dollars intended for "shovel-ready" projects hits the ground at the exact same moment when state governments are responding to widespread budget deficits and dreary bottom lines by slashing (or completely turning off) funding for historic preservation programs.

We're definitely feeling it in the state I work in. Our State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) is understaffed, and reports are taking a long time to get reviewed (longer than the usual 30-day turnaround). Municipal and state projects have been put on hold. The money is available, but it can't get out. Logjam.

There is some really good information on the Perfect Storm website. Check out the State By State Storm Tracker to see how much stimulus money is heading for your state; then check out the rest of the site to see how to access a slice or two of that pie. Get the money moving to historic preservation and heritage issues (including archaeology!) before the developers convince the governments we're too much of a pain in the ass to bother with in the first place.

Hat Tip: Society for Historical Archaeology for getting the word out.

What About The Drafts?

It is definitely the end of semester. All the blogs I regularly read have suddenly sprung to life en masse. As well as getting my regular fixes again, it is nice to know in a very tangible way that it's not just me who gets overwhelmingly swamped. Yes, I only teach as an adjunct, but this is also the start of fieldwork season at The Regular Gig. It has required much overtime this year (better than a pink-slip, lemme tell you what), so I've been crispy.

As part of her end-of-semester and Spring cleaning, Dr. Crazy is tossing out reams of paper. Including her dissertation drafts. Now, I'm a tosser. I don't keep drafts. But I keep hearing about people who DO keep drafts. I'd love to know why... I mean, maybe keep a first draft for nostaligia, to compare how horrendous it was compared to The Final Product. But are there other reasons I'm missing?

The Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization in New York State working to establish a science and technology center and museum at Wardenclyffe, the last extant lab used by Nikola Tesla. The land is currently for sale.

In 1901, Tesla purchased 200 acres on Long Island's north shore from James Warden. These 200 acres were part of an 1,800 acre potato farm along what is today Route 25A in Shoreham, NY. The site became known as Wardenclyffe, after the former owner. Here, Tesla established what would become his only remaining laboratory building.

Tesla is a pretty compelling figure. It would be a shame for his last remaining lab to disappear. In addition to his many scientific achievements, Tesla has made quite an impression in popular culture. Perhaps it was his eccentric personality, his grand vision of where science was going (which many thought was outlandish, but some of which has or will soon come to pass), his path-crossing with Edison, his FBI file... whatever the reason, he's one of those people that need only be referred to by a single name. Seriously, hands up if you knew a) Tesla wasn't his first name and b) if you knew Nikola was, and c) how to spell Nikola without looking it up. I got 2/3, so there.

Some popular culture incarnations of Tesla:

David Bowie as Nikola Tesla in the 2006 film, The Prestige. With Hugh Jackman. Bowie as Tesla = pretty amazing. The rest of the film was pretty good, too.

The first film Superman cartoon short, released in 1941, has Superman fighting a Mad Scientist who, with his death ray (which Tesla was working on) is set on destroying those who laughed at him. AC current makes a cameo appearance when the Mad Scientist turns up the juice! According to Wiki, the scientist is referred to as Tesla. I didn't catch the reference when I watched it, and it's not in the transcription, either. But, it sure does appear to be a caricature of Tesla, 2 years before he died, even.

He appears in a popular cartoon by Kate Beaton, who is rocking the world with her history cartoons. She can draw, she's articulate, and damn funny, too.

I'm sure there is something in all of this about preservation, public history, history of science, what's important, mass media, the relevance of history, why place is important, etc., but I am not articulating it particularly well. Still, there it is.

Saving The Modern Era

A short post today; I have much to do, and not much time to do it in (Quick! Everything EVERYTHING into the end-of-semester boat! Double-time!)... but I thought this was cool. It is also a cautionary tale about digital media, throwing things away, and making fun of geeks who love technology.

From Old Dirt-New Thoughts, a description (with photos!) of saving the digital archive of the Lunar Orbiter missions in the late 1960s.