Curatorial team monthly report for September 2004

Janna continues with the cataloging process for the 1,025 music rolls that were in the Methodist Church, including researching, cleaning, and preparing the rolls for storage. Marge is approaching the end of the annual cleaning of all of our exhibit areas. Our volunteers have also continued with cleaning, as well as completing data entry and conducting historic research for the Fairweather Parlor exhibit. Pat continues proofreading and updating our catalog records, as well as working with conservators and cataloging materials from the Boots & Shoes display in Nevada City. She completed the proposed 2005 curatorial budget, and prepared and delivered a presentation for the P&I Committee and the Commission meetings.

We moved wagons from Prasch Blacksmith Shop to Kiskadden so that the Preservation Crew could get in and finish work on Prasch. Our thanks to Jack Frost for modifying our lift trucks to use safely with our wagons. This prevents wear & tear on already fragile wheels. We had lanterns re-wired for use in the newly renovated conference room in Content's Corner. And, on September 30, Pat attended a reception at the Mai Wah Museum in Butte, with volunteer Shirley Groff. We continue to look forward to a long, productive collaboration with their organization.

We had a visit from Ed and Carole Davison of Salem, Oregon, whose grandmother was an itinerant medical doctor in southwest Montana between 1874 and 1890. We had a very interesting and enjoyable conversation! We also had a visit from Alan Scott of Australia, who was in town teaching a workshop on earth oven building. He was interested in seeing some of the Meaderville Bakery equipment that was found in the Gilbert Brewery last winter. He gave us lots of information on how these objects were made and used—thank you, Alan. And Brian Sparks, Director of the Yellowstone Gateway Museum in Livingston, was in town for the Heritage Development Area workshops. He stopped by for a tour of the Curatorial Center and a brief tour of Virginia City and Nevada City. We always appreciate sharing experiences with our colleagues in Montana's museums.

The MIOs (Most Interesting Objects) for September are the shoe lasts from the Boots & Shoes exhibit in Nevada City. The objects in that building, most collected by Charlie Bovey from the O'Rourke Shoe Company in Butte, are being removed and cataloged so that the floor can be repaired. A last is a wooden form on which a shoe is built (there are also hat lasts for hatmaking). In addition to hundreds of shoemaking machines, tools, shoe buttons, patterns, and other related materials, we have cataloged over 160 of these wooden lasts. The lasts range in date from around 1875 to the 1930s, and included those for children's, women's and men's shoes. Many of the lasts are carved or padded, shaped for individual feet from a time when every pair of shoes was custom made. Pictured are two lasts for children's shoes, dating from around 1900, and a pair of lasts for women's shoes dating from around 1920.