As the end of July nears, I have now completed more than half of my internship at the President Street Station Museum in Baltimore. My last post focused on the relaxed and informal atmosphere of this place in comparison to the other historical sites at which I have worked. These impressions remain unaltered, but there is much more to say about my experience here over the past month.
In the life of working or volunteering at a museum, there is often little to do. How busy one is depends on how the museum’s popularity. If the building attracts a lot of visitors on a particular day, then I can expect to be heavily occupied in telling the story of its history and focus to the people. But on other days, we go hours without a single visitor, and I am left with nothing to do. I frequently use that time to read for my Master’s thesis or to do other random things at my leisure. This happens often.
In the midst of so many hours of inactivity, I have been given something to keep me moderately busy. The director of the Friends of President Street Station, Robert Reyes, is of part-Filipino ancestry. His father, Thomas Reyes, was one of several businessmen, many of whom were also of Filipino origin, who popularized the yo-yo, which was originally a Filipino toy, in the United States. They did so primarily from the 1930s into the 1950s. Robert is working on a project in conjunction with several museums in the United States, the most notable of which probably being the Filipino American National Historical Society Museum in Stockton, California, to uncover more about the origins and lives of these “yo-yo men.” At his behest, I have been combing online records, primarily in Ancestry.com and Newspapers.com, searching for the names that he has given me in an effort to learn more about them. The matters of primary focus are whether or not they came from the Philippines and the dates in which they were active. I was given 40 names, and have thus far confirmed the Filipino origins of about half of them, in addition to finding information about a few of the others.
When we were first discussing the details of what I would do at the President Street Station Museum, Robert told me that I might be given a research project to conduct, but he was vague on the details. Out of all of the possibilities, I would have never guessed that I would be assigned to research 20th century yo-yo men. When I volunteered to work at a museum dedicated to the history of Baltimore in the American Civil War, this was certainly not what I had signed up for. I have enjoyed it nonetheless. Any opportunity for someone to expand their knowledge and research experience should be welcomed, even if the nature of it is odd or unexpected. There have been other benefits. Having access to Ancestry.com has allowed me to find records of my own family history. Additionally, my uncle lives in the Philippines, and his wife and daughter were born there. I have learned a reasonable amount about the country’s history from listening to them. The project therefore happens to be of some personal significance.
Although I have found aspects of this work to be a little unorthodox, I have nonetheless enjoyed my time at President Street Station. I have earned more public history experience and more familiarity with genealogical and newspaper research, and that is certainly not a bad thing.
William Plesser
