Harrison Smith Museum of Military History Summer Internship Blog Post 6

Week 6 of my internship with the Museum of Military History focused on three specific areas within the institution. The first was acquisition, additional research, and logging process of donated military related items. The second was learning and executing curational techniques employed by the institution's executive director Chris Robertson, and the museum’s curator/operations manager Mathus Williams. The third was continued research on items found within the museum’s World War I collection and new analysis and investigation on the various trench styles found on the Western Front; which I will go into in more detail within my next paragraph. On my previously blog post, I mentioned how I was going to present mock labeling and an exhibition pamphlet for the First World War I exhibition to Mr. Robertson and Mr. Williams for approval. I have created rough drafts of both items, however due to a governmental funding veto that occurred in early June, the Museum of Military History has changed its planned exhibition layout for the foreseeable future.

The institution was in the running for funding that would have allowed the institution to build a second floor within the pre-existing structure. Mr. Robertson’s plan was that if the museum received the funding, the museum would close in late 2022 and reopen in early to mid 2023. This second floor would become the new home to exhibits ranging from the American Revolutionary War to the First World War. After the second floor was built Mr. Robertson wanted to build an era accurate Entente style trench at the beginning of the First World War exhibition. Museum visitors would have to go through a small trench system before reaching the area where items would be on display. However since the second story is not planned on being constructed within the next year, Mr. Robertson wants to build the trench system within the area of the current World War I exhibition. This means that the entire First World War exhibition will be having a dramatic face lift and much of the collection currently on display will be moved around; which creates the perfect opportunity of constructing an immersive narrative (an actual trench paired with items that tell a compelling narrative and connect museum guests to the past.) One of the museum’s volunteers is a man named Roger, a talented jack of all trades who has a passion for history and for item and set building. Roger has worked on various historical Hollywood productions; creating era accurate props and designing the landscapes and buildings where historic events took place. Roger and I to work collaboratively to construct the walkable trench that Mr. Robertson has envisioned. Due to this most of my research over the past week and half has been focused on World War I trenches. Roger and I have already created a materials list for the items we will need to construct the trenches. This upcoming Wednesday, Roger and I are going to meet and show Mr. Robertson the different styles of trenches and figure out exactly what themes we are planning on depicting within the walkable trench itself (trench foot, barbed wire, aerial combat viewed from below, no-man’s land, gas attacks, rats, etc.)

Besides planning for the upcoming trench project, Mr. Williams and I continued to work with the institution’s cataloging software Past Perfect. I brought in replica World War I propaganda from my collection to temporarily add to the First World War exhibition until the institution begins construction on the trench system. The reason why I brought in the propaganda pieces is because I felt the exhibition was missing some of the key reasons why America entered the First World War in the first place. Although the propaganda does not fully capture the reasons why, it provides museum goers a better understanding of the art that Americans saw during the early phases of the First World War up until and into when America joined the conflict in April of 1917. Mr. Robertson gave me full creative control of where I could place the propaganda within the exhibition, and he thoroughly approved of this mini-project once I completed it. I also fully logged, tagged, photographed, and cataloged these pieces of propaganda with the museum’s Past Perfect myself. I will be creating a brief label for the propaganda pieces of the weekend and continue constructing the mock exhibition pamphlet and labels, however I am not focusing too heavily on these mock items for the time being because of the massive overhaul that is planned for the First World War exhibition over the next few weeks.

Last but not least, Mr. Williams tasked me with dressing and displayed two World War II German mannequins. Mr. Williams provided me with photos of the various German units' uniforms and I went to work dressing them and displaying the mannequins within the museum’s Second World War exhibition. All in all it was a very productive and educational week and I cannot wait to return next Tuesday and Wednesday.