A Fun Day Out: Maryland Museum of Military History Internship

 A Fun Day Out: Maryland Museum of Military History Internship 

The UH-60 Black Hawk that I rode in!

           Within the past month, the Maryland Museum of Military History has experienced a significant amount of progress in moving our archives from the first floor, which consists of a small room that can barely contain our current collection, to classrooms 2 and 4, located in the basement. While the transformation of these two classrooms is not fully complete, the new archival shelves that were given to our museum by Fort Meade have been built and have started to be used for proper storage. The only things that are missing are the filing cabinets, tables, tiles, desks, and other items that will add to the overall quality of our new archival space. Although the archives have undergone many important updates, this blog post will not provide an in-depth description of these changes. Instead, I will be showcasing the reward my co-workers and I received after we were given an award from the Maryland Military Department.

           On November 5, 2023, the 5th Regiment Armory hosted an event for its employees where they provided food and games, as well as gave their employees awards for their work that supports both the Maryland Military Department and the overall quality of Maryland’s armories. Alongside the recognition of the museum’s progress and work, I, along with five other employees, received the Chief of Staff award from the Maryland Military Department. It recognizes my “significant contributions to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and productivity within the agency.” While there were a few rewards attached to this award such as additional Paid Time Off, the largest and most exciting reward was the participation in the military’s test day for their annual Bosslift Program at an Air National Guard Base. This program was established in 1972 to promote cooperation and understanding between service members and their civilian employers. While my co-workers and I may not have participated in the actual event, we served as the National Guard’s practice groups for the actual event that took place the next day. This meant that we followed the program’s schedule and provided feedback on areas where they could improve.

           Our schedule began with a meeting where we listened to opening statements from the Adjutant General (TAG) and watched an instructional safety video that taught us about the proper way to enter and exit a UH-60 Black Hawk. From there, we retrieved our earplugs, because the sound of a helicopter could burst our ear drums, walked to the platform, and entered the helicopter as groups of 5 or 6. After buckling up and waiting a few minutes for the pilot, the UH-60 Black Hawk lifted into the air and allowed me to experience my first helicopter ride! It was exhilarating to see familiar locations like the White Marsh Mall from above and I made sure to take plenty of photos. When my group landed in an empty field, we were escorted to another area where the Army National Guard had set up workshops. We learned about various aspects of the Army National Guard like the the medical field and the weaponry they use, participated in a simulation where we got to shoot fake weapons, and got to ride in an armored military vehicle. I rode in the High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, also known as the Humvee. 

           After learning about the Army National Guard and taking a quick break for lunch, the groups were again divided and guided by a guardsman to workshops that introduced us to the inner workings of the Air National Guard. My group’s first workshop was at the base’s new fire station where they had various tables displaying an array of weaponry and equipment used by the Fire Department, Security Forces, and Emergency Management. It was interesting to learn and see the equipment that they used on a daily basis. Although it’s tough to describe, one of the guardsmen let me throw a camera that was on wheels and control it with the remote! From there, my group was guided to a conference room where we learned about the Cyber Operations Specialists, and then we were taken to the base’s hangar where we got to have a close view of an A10 Thunderbolt and talked to various pilots who fly these enormous jets for a living. It was amazing to see the inner workings of these jets and learn about the care and use that they undergo. Finally, the last workshop my group attended took place in another conference room where we were introduced to the support staff of the Air National Guard and given a brief overview of Family Support, Chaplains Office, Psychological Health, and Yellow Ribbon.

           While my internship with the Maryland Museum of Military History has been full of excitement and fun, nothing can beat this memorable experience where I not only got to interact with various equipment used by the Maryland National Guard but I got to learn about the important role that they play in the state of Maryland.

In Preparation for the Big Move

 

In Preparation for the Big Move

A helmet that I previously 

            As I have stated in my previous post, I am currently interning at the Maryland Museum of Military History at the Fifth Regiment Armory in Baltimore, Maryland. I have been interning at this facility for almost a year and have yet to be left with a large project to complete as most of my job includes accomplishing smaller tasks such as cataloguing. However, for the past few months I, along with my coworkers, have been working towards helping the museum accomplish its largest project ever, moving. 

To allow you to understand the large project my coworkers and I are in the process of completing I must first explain the layout of the museum and some problems that we experience in our workplace. To begin, our facility is a three-story building and includes a basement. Our museum and archives are on the first floor in a small room that barely fits all the objects and documents that we have and have not cataloged. In fact, some of the objects and documents are stored in various closets around the building where they are not receiving the treatment they deserve. These conditions have caused my boss, Barbara Taylor, to search for new rooms within the facility so our archives can flourish. A couple of months ago, we found those rooms in the basement, in what are currently known as Classrooms 2 and 4. These two spaces are much larger than our current room, can accommodate our increasing workforce, and will allow room for our new archival storage units.

One of the most important tasks that will support our move is acquiring proper shelving, cabinets, mobile storage cabinets, storage racks, and other items that are needed to help our museum. My boss and I have accomplished this by obtaining archival storage items from Fort Meade, an army base whose archives are no longer in use. After visiting Fort Meade numerous times, we have not only gained the approval of Fort Meade’s previous archives directors but collected a couple of new historical items like panoramas of various troops from the 29th Division. Yes, I did have to catalog those right when got back from those trips. While I did have to store those photos and items in storage closets and tight spaces within the archives, I am relieved by the thought that our facility will soon be upgraded with professional archival storage cabinets. I understand that it may seem like I am fawning over a couple of cabinets, but I cannot emphasize the importance of this agreement and these new archival cabinets. These units provide more space for us workers by consolidating the number of objects on a shelf and creating an area where we can safely store the history of the National Guard. Not only that, but it will allow us to better track the location of each historical object and incorporate that into PastPerfect.

We may have completed other tasks that better prepared us for this move such as painting the classrooms, acquiring proper safety regulations and air conditioning, and obtaining new flooring. Our largest accomplishment for this moves so far is the transfer agreement that helps set our museum on the right path to professionally and safely store our collection.

Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum Summer 2023

 

Hello everyone,

This is Emmy! And, this is my final blog post about my internship from this past summer 2023. To ‘wrap up’ the summer season, we began a video series called, “50 Years 50 Artifacts.” Every week leading up to our anniversary, July 2024, we will be sharing 50 different artifacts around the museum that we believe either hold a unique story or are linked directly with Babe, himself. But, a series like this doesn’t spur out of nothing. The initial listing of artifacts to include was about 100 items long (some items already displayed, in our basement archive, in the super, secure archive off-campus, or even privately owned items). It took quite a while to solidify the listing down to 50. And, if you must know, there was quite the debates about what to keep on the list and what not to. However, once the list was secured, myself, and my co-worker and UMBC alumni Katie, began filming. Immediately we realized something, we are no experts in filming B-roll for museum artifacts. The first secession of filming artifacts was a bit disorganized as one may imagine. The artifacts, themselves, made up of all different sizes, ages, weights, and materials. So, no set up was the same. For example, the Yomiuri Shimbun Award (samurai helmet) placing it on the turn table was quite the challenge. The front weighed more than the back thus when we spun the lazy Susan, it would stop half way. After what seemed at least ten failed attempts, for a perfect spin, we got the footage. But, this was only half of the content that needed to be done. While I focused on the videography, Katie did the photography. Again, as the secession went on, we learned, refocused, and most of all, realized this is a much larger task than anticipated. At the same time, we both recognize that by tackling this as a team, we should be able to have all 50 artifacts filmed and ready to edit, and later published, right on time.

The next few secessions after this is where, I believe, we made some bigger strides with filming and finding a common ground. We were able to set up a larger vertical blackout set up for filming much larger items such as Jonathan Ogden’s jersey (which is almost as tall as me), found a much more stable environment for photographing the trophy artifacts (jerry-rigged a clear mailbox container to be a soft-box for our spotlights), and much more. Not only this, but Katie and I decided to switch roles for one of our secessions, while she did the videography, I did the camera work. It was new, and at the same time, very exciting to try and document these artifacts as best as I could. I will note, the trophies, such as the Lombardy and -83 World Series trophy, were extremely difficult. No amount of soft lighting could dampen the amount of shine that the trophies emanated. Despite this, Katie and Shawn, our director, did note that even the Baltimore Sun, Orioles, and Raven’s photographer had issues with photographing these items. Shawn noted that, and I quote, “In order for them to have their level of approval with photographs, they quite literally brought in their OWN softbox to put around the trophies so that almost no extra lighting came in.” With this new knowledge, it let my courage to continue photography a little less damaged.

I should heavily note, we are a small team. Most of our photos for artifacts are all done by the immediate staff. We don’t have a “dedicated” photography or videography team. We all pitch in where and when we can. Yet, I believe our products so far don’t fall too behind many other local museums work. Do what you can with the resources you’re provided. Try and make the best of any situation. Below I’ve attached some “behind the scenes” photos of our set ups.  We work with what we’ve got!

Practical History Experience at TSA

            By the end of my internship for the TSA Historian I had learned a lot. Working at the TSA HQ was my first office work experience so I learned how to do things like send professionally formatted emails. Which is easy but is still important to know.

Updating the Modality statistics taught me about research. Some statistics were easy to update like the aviation modality, which had recently updated statistics that were easy to find with a google search. Other modalities like the passenger/freight rail and highway modalities had statistics that were hard to find and were not updated regularly. The harder to find statistics taught me how to better search for information and that some websites had people I could contact to help me find information, like the archivist for the Department of transportation. Learning how to Research information is useful for my classwork and a potential history career.

 Filming the interviews and editing the transcripts for the TSA YouTube video series: “Historian Presents: Did You Know.” Gave me experience interviewing people who lived through historical events. I learned how to ask relevant questions and gained experience being on camera. While editing the transcripts I learned that speaking is much more efficient than writing. Our mistakes and interruptions during filming would take a minute or two in the recording but that would be transcribed as a few paragraphs or a page in the transcript. Editing the transcript was similar to adding a quote to an essay, taking the important information and removing the unnecessary parts while still getting the point across. Overall, my internship taught me important skills for office work and a career in history. Researching topics, interviewing people, properly quoting and citing sources are all important skills for a career in history and more immediately are useful for completing my classwork.

All is Well that Ends Well

    In this final entry, I would like to share the recent developments that have come out of my

internship at the Heurich House. Additionally, this will serve as a point of reflection on my

experience overall this semester. As of last week, at the time of writing I completed both of my

required test tours with flying colors. For my first test tour, Jenna and I walked around the house

while I talked her through how I wanted things to go. The major issues I ran into was that I ran

out of time and had to find things to cut. Unfortunately, given that I only had one hour means I

had to focus on things related to technology and try not stray too far from that path. This is easier

said than done in a place filled with so many great stories! An example of something I was sad to

see go was the story I found about how Christian Heurich met famed composer Richard Wagner

on one of his trips to Germany.

    Another tour aspect that did not materialize like I envisioned was my plan to conduct a

scavenger hunt in the house. Due to a number of factors such as preservation and space

limitations, I ended up morphing this idea into allowing guests to explore spaces in the house and

having them point things out that they considered to be technology. The second test tour was

actually quite special as instead of giving it to a closed group, I was given the go ahead to start

presenting my material to the public! I must say, I was rather nervous at the onset of this tour.

For one thing it was only the second time I gave the tour ever and additionally these were TRUE

guests looking for an enjoyable museum experience. Thankfully, both tours I gave that day were

not only very kind, but they were also extremely engaging and interested in having the

conversation that was my tour. I had designed my tour to rely on guest interaction so this was all

I could ask for. At the end, both groups also gave me a lot of positive and encouraging feedback

that boosted my confidence. As a matter of fact, the only negative thing I heard was that the 

guests wished they could stay longer and hear more stories! Before both of my test tours were

even done, I had all of my real tours scheduled for early December so now I have plenty of time

to prepare for those.

    Besides the tour component, I also had the opportunity to talk with a few other members

of the Heurich House Team. My favorite of these conversations I had was with our Collections

Manager, Kimberly Totten. From her, I learned about what it’s like to work with collections such

as cataloging objects, acquiring new items, and her general work experience up to that point.

From her experience, I also learned there was more to collections than I previously considered.

This included tracking the types of bugs that might make their way into the house or decorating

the museum space for Christmas. That latter was very exciting as she showed us many items, I

was previously unfamiliar with. These items ranged from Christmas decorations to Christmas

themed Heurich Brewing Company advertisements.

    Overall, I feel that my experience at the Heurich House this semester has been extremely

enjoyable and educational. Since I started my journey in the world of History, I have wanted to

work with museums in some capacity. While I have visited many museums in my lifetime this

was the first time that I was able to step behind the scenes and see what it’s really like to live the

museum life. Furthermore, I got to dive into my public history skills and take what I have

learned so far and make it a reality. This of course manifested itself in my tour plan as well as the

many learning goals I set with Jenna at the start of the Fellowship. Some of these goals included

running successful programs with limited resources, exhibition design and upkeep, and day to

day museum operations. Above all else, the staff and other fellows at the Heurich House have

been so kind. Not only just sharing their knowledge and time with me, but also by making me

feel like part of the team that moves the museum forward.

Our Director of Preservation showing us around.

The table is set for Christmas Dinner.

Some of the Christmas themed brewery items.

The author telling some stories to some guests.

My Reflections as a Research Assistant Intern Part III

Looking back on my time as a Research Assistant intern, I find that my experience was fulfilling and illuminating. What I liked most about the work was the ability to utilize the skills I learned as a graduate student at UMBC to put into practice as a historical researcher. This experience showed me that this kind of work is not only available after graduation, but can be applicable to numerous careers. This type of work allows you to fully immerse yourself and develop your research skills. As a historian who values and enjoys the research aspect as much as the writing, having the chance to work on different historical projects allowed me to broaden my historical knowledge while contributing to historical education. 

The project I worked on with Dr. Musgrove was a lot of fun. My job was to research the resurgence of Black Power during the 1980s and 1990s. I began by tracing the history of the resurgence from the late 60s and into the 70s. Dr. Musgrove gave me specific datasets to follow that allowed me to search a vast number of conventions, summits, and organizational meetings across the United States in a finite amount of time. Documenting this information required me to search multiple types of primary and secondary sources. I was able to search through archives, video, letters, speeches, political ephemera, and books in order to develop comprehensive details for Dr. Musgrove’s project. This was particularly fun because it gave me a greater sense of the era I was researching. Incorporating details like clothing, music, art, poetry, as well as ideas was important because it encompassed the Black Power movement as a whole. 

The only thing that disappointed me about the internship was that I was not able to finish the project. The second stage of the internship was applying my research to a website that was to be developed for the public. This website was to accompany the information for Dr. Musgrove’s new book on Black Power resurgence. I was asked to continue the work over winter break so I may be able to fulfill that desire yet.  Although it was not part of my assignments or duties, I would like to have visited the local museums in DC and Baltimore on civil rights/black power activism in order to broaden my perspective on writing for the public. As a research assistant, my responsibilities lay simply with research and not framing ideas for the writing itself–that responsibility is solely for the author or creator of the project. However, in visiting museums or scouring websites on subject matter, one sees how information and material objects have been incorporated into exhibitions or may prompt ideas as to what is lacking. It is important for the researcher to ask, “What do I want to see that is not there?” This can allow the researcher to look in archives for material that is not necessarily exhibited elsewhere in order to create a unique experience for the public. 

This internship definitely heightened my research skills, allowing me the confidence to pursue other research positions outside of the university. The skills I have learned directly translate into numerous public history positions that seek quality research and writing skills for museum exhibitions, websites, historical societies, libraries or consulting. I am looking forward to applying these skills to my thesis and to use them after graduation with a fulfilling career. 

Black Conventions and Summits, Datasets and Spreadsheets: Research Assistant Internship, Part II

The first project I worked on this summer as a Research Assistant with Dr. Musgrove was the documentation of Black summits and conventions. While the focus of the project highlights Black Power resurgence during the 1980s and 90s, the roots of this era began in the late 1960s. Starting in 1966, the new epoch of Black Power revolved around a series of national and state conventions and summits in order for Black leadership and activists to discuss and set a political agenda that would address the contemporary issues of Black America.  

The bulk of my work consisted of reading from secondary sources in order to record information pertaining to Black leadership and activists' attempts in organizing for national and state conventions and summits. Besides scouring a large number of books, I searched numerous primary sources, reading contemporary newspapers, articles, and magazines as well as scanned video footage of news broadcasts and documentaries. All of these sources had to be synthesized and recorded into a series of datasets on google docs and google spreadsheets. For the conventions, each dataset consisted of recording pertinent information surrounding its activity: name of conference, location, date, organizers, attendees, quotes, purpose and demands, efforts toward achieving goals, and archives to primary sources or video coverage. Each entry had to be properly footnoted in order to be confirmed later by Dr. Musgrove if needed. One thing we have all learned as History majors is that sloppy note-taking and inconsistent footnotes can get a writer into a lot of trouble. Plagiarism is not only universally frowned upon, but it is illegal. After each convention was recorded and uploaded, I would begin work on another convention and the process of reading and recording would begin all over again. Often, when reading for one convention in a secondary source, I would gain insight or new information into a different summit. In this case, I often had three or four google doc tabs open on my computer in order to quickly access the document I needed. Organization is definitely key. 

One of the most enjoyable and rewarding parts of the research was when I was searching the internet for primary sources and archives. The research databases we have access to as UMBC students is quite impressive and I will miss them dearly after I graduate. JSTOR if you’re listening… I need the hookup. Anyway, enough shameless promotion. I was able to discover key archives that held collections of Black convention information. My work as a graduate research assistant in UMBC’s Special Collections has taught me the importance of utilizing archival institutions and how to navigate their finding aids in order to quickly assess what documents are on file. Part of what makes a great research paper, book or project are the sources that one uses. Finding primary sources in the form of records, personal papers and journals, video and audio recordings, and material objects can bring that project to another level, setting it apart from your contemporaries. 

After these google docs are transferred into spreadsheets the next step is to take the completed series of projects and upload the information into a newly created website. With the help of the UMBC Geography department and a web designer, Dr. Musgrove will be able to capture the history of Black Power resurgence, spanning four decades, for the public to view. In 2021 Dr. Musgrove launched http://blackpowerindc.umbc.edu/, a web-based map of Black Power activism in the nation’s capital between 1961 and 1998. This will not be so much a continuation of that project, but another much needed piece to the puzzle. 

Moving A Museum

    

    For the past month the museum has mainly been preparing to move the majority of its collection to a new location consisting of three rooms, two large and one small, in the basement of the 5th Regiment Armory building. Within the last three weeks, two of the rooms have had storage systems installed so that the museum’s collection can be properly stored. These rooms also provide an extra level of security given that only employees at the 5th Regiment Armory would be able to access these rooms.  In addition, these rooms are less susceptible to fire given the masonry walls and tile flooring, as well as a sprinkler system in all three of the rooms. However, the greatest advantage to moving the museum’s collection to these three rooms is that they provide greater space for storage which will allow the collection to continue to grow. 

One of the rooms contains high density storage units that are on rails and are motor powered. The contents of this high-density storage include uniforms, hats, portraits, medals, and other objects which are the most valuable within the museum’s collection. A bonus of having the high-density storage in this location is that the room is more easily climate controlled and secure than the room in which these items are currently stored. In addition, this new high density storage system has a special cabinet that is going to be used to contain mold contaminated materials until they can be properly cleaned and treated.  One of the main reasons that the museum collection has to be moved to the basement is because the collection’s current location, in a room on the first floor of the 5th Regiment Armory building, does not have a floor which would be able to support the weight of the high-density storage system that was installed in the basement. 

The other large room has had shelving units installed and will contain the museum’s archive. This archive consists of numerous documents, books, field manuals, photographs, etc. In addition to the shelving units flat files are going to be installed to maximize the number of items that can be stored in this room. This room will also serve as the primary room in which the museum staff’s workstations are going to be located. However, given the amount of material and storage units that are going to be in this room, the amount of space that will be available to those working in this room will be minimal.  

The third smaller room will eventually be converted into an area which will hold the museum’s firearms collection. The plan is to have special safes installed in the room to ensure that this collection remains secured and, given the location of this room in an adjoining hallway between the two larger rooms, it will be easier to access than the current safe that is used to house the firearms. However, it is unclear when the new safes will be installed and, as of now, it appears to just be an idea until the appropriate funding and preparations have been made. For now the room will be used as an office and some of the museum’s collection will be stored in it. 

The process of preparing and moving the museum’s collection to this new location, while still in the early stages, has been a point of stress for everyone given the fact that the move needs to be completed by March.  This timetable exists because the room in which the museum’s offices and collection now reside is going to be used by another department within the 5th Regiment Armory and, therefore, it is critical that the move is completed on schedule. However, there are still some issues with planning how objects and archival material will be organized within the new location that could present a bit of an issue as the situation continues to develop. Therefore, the beginning of the move has been relatively slow and methodical as we attempt to ensure that any potential issues with storage are minimized.

When not assisting with this moving process, the majority of my time has been spent continuing to learn how to use the PastPerfect system for cataloguing. During the past month I have catalogued over fifty items in the collection, including field manuals, training circulars, a pen and pencil set, military patches, and award certificates that date back to the 1940s. Overall, this process has been very interesting because, unlike what I may have encountered had I interned at a larger or more well-funded institution, many mistakes were made by previous museum staff in the cataloguing process.  Therefore, coming across these cataloguing mistakes, learning what was done wrong, and what the proper way to catalogue is has been greatly beneficial. In addition, dealing with all the cataloguing mistakes has allowed me to see how much improper cataloguing techniques can interfere with a museum’s operations. Using improper catalogue accession and object ID numbers can make it incredibly difficult for future museum staff and researchers to find objects and documents within a collection. There have been more than a few instances where we may know that an object is in our collection but are unable to determine where it is because, when the object was acquired and stored, the person that catalogued it failed to indicate the item’s location. In addition, improper cataloguing is a big issue when it comes to knowing how and when objects or documents were added to the museum’s collection. There are countless examples within the museum’s collection where it’s virtually impossible to determine who donated items, when they were donated, and if/where those items are in the collection. All of these issues can arise from improper cataloguing and while these issues may not immediately present themselves, they can be crippling for an institution years down the line. 

Interviewing Living History

 

During my Internship I worked on two projects. I updated the information on Modalities and filmed and edited the transcript for a TSA YouTube video series titled “Historian Presents: Did You Know.” These two projects made up most of my work during the internship.

               A modality is the word TSA uses for the types of transportation they administer, for example aviation, passenger and freight rail, and maritime ports. TSA made a poster for each modality with a summary of what it was and how TSA regulated it. My job was to update the statistics on the posters and reword any confusing explanations. Rewording the explanations was easy because they were already well written. The hardest and most time-consuming part was updating the statistics. Some were easy like the aviation modality, which had statistics from the TSA website that were updated recently. Other modalities were not as simple to update, the maritime and highway modalities were barely mentioned on the TSA website, so I had to check other government sites like the Department of Transportation (DOT) or private organizations that kept track of the statistics I needed. I am relatively certain I found the same websites that the original creator of the posters copied from because no other website bothered to write down things like how many buses or bridges there are in the U.S. For the number and length of highway tunnels I had to contact an archivist from the DOT because their website had numbers from more than five years ago. This went well, the archivist responded quickly and was polite, but it shows how scattered the information I needed was. I cited where I found my information so the next person who updates the modality at least has a starting point.

The other Project I worked on was the filming of interviews and editing their transcripts for the TSA YouTube video series: “Historian Presents: Did You Know.” I was able to be in two of the videos. My favorite is the video on the changes to the Transportation Security Officer (TSO) uniforms. TSOs are the people you see in airport security. I interviewed two former TSOs, one was the model for the current blue uniform when it was still being selected.  The interviews were around fifteen to twenty minutes each, but they were massively cut down for the seven-minute video that made it to You Tube. After filming the interviews, I was assigned to edit the raw transcripts into ones that could be posted on the TSA website. I had to remove any repeated sections and mistakes we made during filming. I also put in time stamps from the recording. This assignment was a lot more fun than updating the modalities but it was difficult to align the transcript with the audio recording because our mistakes and interruptions during filming could take up a minute of two of the recording but that would be transcribed as paragraphs or pages on the transcript. Eventually I got used to jumping between the transcript and the recording, so it became easier to edit by the second interview.

First Day in a New House

 

     (Edited Version of my first post that got lost) Hello everyone, my name is Frank Milihram and in this post, and others following, I wish to share with you my internship experience! As of Friday, September 8th, 2023, I officially started my Education Fellowship with the Heurich House Museum in Washington, D.C. The Heurich House is a Historic House built between 1891 and 1892 and belonged to D.C.’s largest and at one time oldest brewers, Christian Heurich. The structure is a beautifully preserved example of Victorian era architecture and contains one of the finest interiors in any DC House Museum. Christian himself lived in the house from its completion up until his death at 102 in 1945 and his family and staff lived in the house until 1956. Then from 1956-2003, The DC Historical Society used it as its headquarters and conducted tours out of it. In 2003, a non-profit was organized to purchase the house and turn it into the museum that exists today. In fact, descendants of the Heurich family still reside on its board. For those not familiar with the museum and its mission, “The Heurich House Museum honestly explores the American Experience through the legacy of German immigrant Christian Heurich and his Washington, DC brewery, and creates an equitable path to success for local small-scale businesses.” With this in mind, the museum seeks to emphasize public history and public service through a model that suggests “house museums should be dynamic and relevant to our modern communities.” Here is where my role comes in. The purpose of the Fellowship here at the Heurich House is for me and the other fellows to develop our own tour of the dwelling while also learning practical skills from a behind the scenes learning experience with the museum and its team. The team member who I will be most closely working with is Dr. Jenna Febrizio, Director of Education, and operations. As you will see, she has truly generated a program with adequate scaffolding to ensure an enriching experience for all of us. For the tour project portion to be accomplished I will conduct my own original research through the Museum’s Archive, develop a tour proposal based around initial findings, and create a professional grade tour guide. The latter is a document that would give someone else a basic understanding of the process that is my tour. At the present time, I intend on researching the various technologies in the house and how the occupants’ lives were impacted by them. From that point forward, the plan is to present my final plan in the form of two test tours, one to museum staff and one to a select public group. This is to assure feasibility and flow while also working out any bugs. When all goes well, and I get the thumbs up from Jenna, I will have the opportunity to conduct my tour on multiple occasions for the public when they come for a tour. For the other 50% of the program, I will get a chance to educate myself by talking with other museum team members about their roles, evaluate other exhibits on museum grounds, and witness the process of operations and programing in the museum world. While some students may shutter at the idea of another syllabus and class, Jenna has managed to organize this program in a way pulls on the best elements of a museum studies course and a hands-on experience. 

 Source: https://heurichhouse.org/pages/about

The main staircase

One of the living rooms

Some of the artwork

The dining room

The conservatory

A group photo of myself, Jenna, and the other Fellows

Heurich and the World of Tomorrow

 

Hello everyone, as we have quickly approached the halfway mark for the semester, I would like to update everyone on my work thus far. As hinted in my previous edition, I have decided to focus the topic of my tour for the Heurich House Museum on Technology. Specifically, I will be focusing on the technology that resides inside the house, how it was used, who installed it and the impact it had on the lives of all who dwelled there. Additionally, I plan to incorporate larger themes of the industrial revolution and its impact on American domestic life at the start of the 20th century. The house overall is certainly a marvel when considered from this lens, it was the first house in DC to incorporate fireproof design features, it contains “speaking tubes” that allowed folks to communicate between floors, and it had a burglar alarm system. These are just a few of the many examples I plan to discuss with my audience! Something I am particularly proud of is while attempting to find out more information about a particular company that install electrical appliances in the house, I stumbled across previously unknown photos of Christian Heurich’s Brewery. A book, celebrating the work of the Thomas W. Power Company in Washington D.C, features photos of the Breweries engine room. When I shared this with Jenna, she was very excited as the Museum does not have many interior photographs of the Brewery itself. For my research I have also been trying to find new stories to tell guests when they come to visit. These could include something about technology being used, something that helps visitors connect with the house, gives them a better insight into the period, or even just something for them to relax and have fun with. One story in particular involves Christian’s wife, Amelia Heurich. One day in 1914 Amelia went out to the mall to spend some time outdoors. While there, she witnessed the groundbreaking for the construction of the Lincoln Memorial. A pretty incredible thing to contemplate witnessing. Besides my topic and storytelling, I have also been considering different ways in which I could structure my tour in order to maximize audience engagement. One such idea I have been thinking of is including a scavenger hunt of some sorts on my tour. The challenge with this aspect of my tour will be working within the confines of preservation as I cannot have visitors running around in rooms for the risk of damage to the house. After speaking with Jenna on this particular thought, she thinks it’s a good idea and believes I should certainly try to think of some way to incorporate elements of a scavenger hunt. While researching and developing this tour is one of the main purposes of fellowship, we have also gotten to learn about professional skills and museum operations. In regard to professional skills, Jenna took some time sat down with me the other day to do some goal setting. For this we went over what I hoped to accomplish and learn during the rest of my fellowship. After some discussion I decided I wanted to learn what went into exhibit design by talking to our curator, how to conduct programing with a lack of resources, and how to use museum software such as past perfect. As for museum operations, in October I got the chance to meet with a guy named Dan, the museums preservationist. Dan took us around the whole house showing us some of the preservation work he has done, how things are maintained in the house, and answering some of our other questions about his role. The coolest part of our adventure with Dan was that he took us up to the roof of the house and showed us a hidden room! In fact it was so secret that some of the other museum staff have not even seen it.

Fellowship group photo

Checking out the roof

Our Preservationist showing us the Boiler Room

Speaking Tubes in the Kitchen

One of the new photos I found (Credit: Library of Congress)

Reflecting on my Time at the BMI

 

            I would consider my time at the Baltimore Museum of Industry as an archival intern as well spent.  This experience aided me as I choose which field I wish to enter after I graduate.  I have been interested in archives for a little over a year, after taking a course on museums last summer.  I spent the Fall 2022 semester and the Spring 2023 semester applying for as many internships in archives as I could find in the surrounding area.  I eventually landed a position with the Baltimore Museum of Industry under Maggi Marzolf. 

I used the skills that I have learned in the classroom of analyzing, reading, and attention to detail during my internship experience.  I also acquired many new skills specific to archives, such as accessioning, deaccessioning, and other archival procedures.  This was the most interesting and important part of the internship for me.  I had no previous experience working in archives, so I wanted to take this opportunity to see if it is a career I would like to further pursue.  I really liked the range of tasks that I was able to complete each day.  As someone who does not like to sit and do one thing for too long, I enjoyed the fact that every few hours I could leave one project and work on another one.  This did not mean I abandoned the project, just that I would split my time up among a few each day.  I also liked the diversity of tasks.  There were times when I would be very physically active, moving boxes of materials, or pallets full of boxes and there were other tasks where I would be sitting at a computer digitizing finding aids.  Finally, my favorite part of this internship was the interesting historical material I had the chance to look through.  A time that I will always remember was when I was undertaking an inventory of a flat file, where I came across an old newspaper from 1776.  I was so excited that I had to sit down and read the whole front page. 

This experience showed me that I can do a job I love, while still being close to history.  I am now considering Graduate Programs in Information and Library Science to further my knowledge of archives and continue to pursue this field as a career.  I would highly recommend the Baltimore Museum of Industry as a destination for any prospective intern looking to work in public history.  Everyone there was extremely kind and welcoming to me and I learned a lot from everyone.    

“Collections & Archives- The Baltimore Museum of Industry.” The Baltimore Museum of Industry, https://www.thebmi.org/collections/.  Accessed 13 Aug. 2023.

Weeding Through the Archives

 

During my internship with the Baltimore Museum of Industry, one of my favorite, and most challenging projects that I aided in was weeding through a vast collection consisting of materials from the Canton Railroad Company, Anne Arundel Corporation, Manning Company, Balmar, Baltimore Copper Paint (Oliver Reed Company), David A. Jacobs, USF&G, and Oak loom.  These materials were donated to the museum in the 1990s and early 2000s, with many boxes never being looked through or processed.  Much of the material came from the Canton Railroad Company, with the Baltimore Museum of Industry housing an estimated 700 boxes of material. 

            The issue with these collections was the way they were stored.  The collections were stored on pallets, inside banker boxes.  They were stacked up to five boxes high and three across, with approximately forty-five boxes on each pallet.  These boxes were stored so high that many began to collapse in on each other.  Another issue with the collections was that some had mold or water damage, making them dangerous to handle.  Finally, the collections had material that fell outside the collections policy of the Baltimore Museum of Industry.  The material included pay stubs, check stubs, personally identifiable information such as Social Security Numbers, receipts, invoices, timecards, and cashed checks.  

At the beginning of the summer, the Baltimore Museum of Industry received a grant to install shelving for the collections.  My job was to aid the archivist to weed through the collections and deaccession materials to make room for the shelving.  My tasks included placing the boxes of materials that remained on new pallets and disposing of the boxes and the materials inside of them that were deaccessioned.  Throughout this process, I tried to focus on what was being deaccessioned and how my supervisor made these decisions.  This taught me much about the difference between record management and archives.  Records management keeps track of a company's finances, while an archive should strive to tell a complete story of a company.  Material that fit record management normally fell out of the Baltimore Museum of Industry’s collection policy; therefore, our approach to making deaccessioning decisions was to determine if the material met the current collections policy of the museum.  Most of the material I listed above such as the pay stubs, check stubs, and other financial material fell out of the Baltimore Museum of Industry’s collection policy and was deaccessioned.  This was an intriguing project because it dealt with an aspect of archives that is broadly ignored, or sometimes frowned upon, which is deaccessioning.  Although it sometimes felt wrong to discard a company's records, it also taught me that an archivist needs to be mindful of the space that they have in their collections, the time it takes to process a collection, and to consider the collection policy very carefully.  One thing I learned from this project is that an archive is only as good as its collection policy. 

Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum Summer 2023

 

Hi everyone,

This is Emmy coming back for another blog post regarding this past summer’s internship with the Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum. Before going into the summer season, here is a bit of context about Babe Ruth. Ruth played on, the then, Minor League Baltimore Orioles for his first year as a “pro.” After this, the Orioles were in need of money. Babe being the youngest, along with most potential, was traded to the Boston Red Soxs for five years. While he did well, the team already had a stellar line up, so they didn’t see him as a foundational member. Thus the Curse of the Bambino, and the Red Soxs went through a major “baseball drought” from 1918-2004. Even though it’s a superstition, it’s always a fun debate. And finally, Babe stayed with the New York Yankees for 14 years, until retirement. And, fun fact, he played every position, 22 year career, except manager. With all this said, when the Oriole’s release their upcoming schedule, we plan for major crowds from the Red Soxs and Yankees. Immediately, we label these homestands in our calendars. Whenever these homestands come, we make sure to get more than enough staff to help with the flow of guests. What wasn’t scheduled was the fact that the Orioles would quickly go from the joke of MLB to “The Underdogs.” Crowds started coming to the museum with every homestand, no matter the team. It was quite incredible to see the amount of people who would travel, even from cross country, “just to see the O’s.” Two of these memorable homestands were the second Yankees games along with the Mets. The Yankees already played the O’s in the first week of April. Crowds were as expected, but, again, I cannot emphasize enough, how quickly the O’s brought in crowds. By their second homestand in July, we knew those tickets and fands were coming. So much so, we already knew, well in advance the entire homestand was sold out. We were completely blown away with the amount of fans. Within a three day homestand, the museum brought in over 1,800 guests, representing 38/50 U.S states also including representation from: Japan, Mexico, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It should be strongly stressed, we have never had this many guests, even before Covid-19. While overwhelming at points, it was completely and utterly heartwarming to have so many baseball fans. At the same time, on the first week of August was the final New York Mets homestand. Just like the Yankees, it was completely sold out. Yet, this was new from our understanding. The New York Mets, typically, did not sell out because their team is, almost never, in high standings. This was new information to us. With the first day of the homestand, it became quickly as to why they sold out. From what guests told us, someone was able to coordinate around 1000 people to take a roundtrip to Baltimore to watch the game. Not just this, they all got matching t-shirts with this ticket package. What’s even funnier, is what the shirt said, “The 7 Line Army Invades the Beast.” Along with this tagline was an owl taking over the stadium and winning? (I’m not quite sure the pictures fans posted aren’t super clear.) It was quite entertaining talking with Mets fans as they were discussing how, “Yeah, we thought we would have a better season, that’s why we chose the design…but ya know ya gotta believe.” So, in the midst of all of O’s orange, black, and white, was a sea of Mets blue. Oriole fans are one level, but every other fan is a totally different experience to interact with. I truly encourage you all to come to the museum during the peak of summer with a homestand. It’s incredible with the amount of stories you get to exchange!

Thoughts on President Street Station

 Thoughts on President Street Station by Thomas Pate

The words I would use to describe this internship are valuable, informative, and self
developing. The reasons for this are that I have networked and gained substantial information on
how to operate and staff a museum. Normally, I was alone at the station, and I would have to
fulfill a variety of roles and coordinate events. Giving tours, stocking the gift shop, and cleaning
were the main duties, but I also had to help get in contact with various individuals both inside
and outside of the museum.
Networking involved coordinating with a contractor to fix the lights. In early July, most
of the lights in the museum had burned out, and I worked with Robert to get a contractor to
install new ones. Unfortunately, when they showed up, it required the whole fixture to be
replaced, and I had to inform Robert of this event. Nevertheless, I learned networking and
communication skills in coordinating the replacement of the lights. I also helped find prospective
students to help code for a museum computer.This will prove invaluable in future museum tasks
that I may take on.
Other tasks that aided in my self-development as a historian were simply improving
relations with the public in educating them on the history of the station. It cannot be overstated
how fun and satisfying the experience of teaching someone something they did not know, like
how the station was a major route of escaped slaves, or the extensive Civil war history that
involved the building. It astonished me to see how many different sorts of individuals entered the
station, only for them to leave with a better understanding of history.
Working at President Street Station, although it came with its challenges, was an
enlightening, fun and informative experience that helped set me up for future careers in the
museum field. I was able to coordinate projects, help network students and workers into aiding
the museum, and teach people the history of the site. I look forward to potentially volunteering
there again in the future, as I did enjoy it.