The fact about artifacts at the Collingwood Museum is they’re piling up and it’s time for some exploratory excavation and catalogue catch-up.
According to a recent staff report sent to Collingwood town council by museum supervisor Susan Warner, the museum staff are working to process a two-year backlog including 600 artifacts and archival items.
Council accepted a museum recommendation and implemented a six-month moratorium on artifact collecting at the Collingwood Museum.
Museum assistant Melissa Shaw walked CollingwoodToday through the process for receiving donations, researching their historical significance and cataloguing them for future reference or exhibits.
Usually what happens first is someone will show up at the museum with items to donate. Shaw said ideally they send an email letting the museum know what they have and when they are coming, but surprise drop-ins do happen.
If the museum’s current collection doesn’t already include another artifact like the one dropped off, staff will work with the donor to complete what’s called a temporary custody receipt. That document includes a list of items dropped off and a general description of the item.
From the beginning, information is really important, according to Shaw. She said one of the most important considerations for collecting artifacts today is whether or not they were part of Collingwood’s history.
She also said staff seek out as much information as possible from the person donating the item.
“It has to have a story,” said Shaw. “We want to know who owned it, what it was for and where it was used. It’s more about the person connected to the artifact. That, for the most part, is the reason we do or don’t accept something.”
Once the museum staff have collected enough information on a potential artifact in order for it to be added to the collection, a report goes to the museum advisory committee, then to the corporate and community services standing committee, then to town council for final approval.
Once approved, museum staff will organize a deed of gift with the owner of the item to transfer legal ownership, and copyright in the case of a photograph, to the Collingwood Museum.
After the ownership transfer, museum staff will catalogue the item, take photographs of it and fill out a condition report for the museum records. That information is input into the museum’s collection management software system and given an identification number.
“We’ve actively been doing that for gifts, but we’re catching up on items received prior to 2007,” said Shaw.
Add that catch-up to the backlog reported by the museum supervisor, and there’s a lot of work ahead of museum staff this winter.
The Collingwood Museum inherited the collection of the former Huron Institute, which started collecting artifacts in 1904. At the time, the institute was interested in all kinds of artifacts and curiosities, so the collection is a bit eclectic, and not always connected to Collingwood.
In its beginning, the Collingwood Museum was in the basement of the library and reflected the museum trends at the time, which included a lot of oddities and things collected by residents and their families as they travelled the world.
For example, the Collingwood Museum artifact collection includes two mandibles of sawtooth shark bills, likely brought back from Australia.
“We have quite a number of pieces that wouldn’t meet the mandate of relating to Collingwood’s history,” said Shaw.
These oddities and all the artifacts owned by the Collingwood Museum are stored in three rooms at the museum. The archive room for photographs and documents, the small items room, and the large objects room, where you’ll find things as big as a dresser made at Collingwood Furniture.
A recent government-funded project included reorganizing the large object room and installing track shelving to make better use of the space. In that room alone there are 3,000 objects.
While there is a need for more storage space in each of the three rooms, purging isn’t an option when the rooms contain historic artifacts.
Occasionally, the museum will take an item out of the collection, but the process is extensive.
First the item has to be recommended for deaccession. Next, museum staff try to find a way for the item to remain in the public realm. In most cases, the artifact goes to another museum where it fits the collection. For example, an item not connected to Collingwood, but from the region may find a new home at the Simcoe County Museum and Archives.
If no public spot can be found, the item goes up for public auction, but museum staff are not allowed to purchase or be involved in the auction process at all, in the interest of transparency. If it isn’t sold at auction, it can be disposed.
Shaw said she doesn’t remember a time where the museum sent an item for disposal, and she’s been there 11 years. In fact, she hasn’t seen any items make it to the auction stage in her time at the museum. Most often, they are transferred to another museum.
It’s a never-ending project to sort through the various boxes labeled “mystery artifacts,” but are making slow progress.
Recently, while looking into the history of some of the artifacts in storage, staff came across a bust of George Brown. There was no digital record of it, but while poring over paper records, a student found typewritten letters that revealed it was on loan to the Collingwood Museum and belonged to the Globe and Mail newspaper. Brown founded the paper. The museum borrowed it in the 1940s, and returned it more than 70 years alter.
In another case, staff discovered photographs of a woman involved in the Second World War, they were loaned to the museum in the 1980s and returned to the woman recently.
“In a lot of cases, the documentation is here, it’s just a matter of finding it,” said Shaw.
In addition to the thrill of solving a mystery, having an organized and well-documented collection better facilitates research.
“It’s ideal to have records and archives where people can find them,” said Shaw, adding it makes sense that someone would come to the Collingwood Museum for all things relating to Collingwood history.
It’s less logical to come to the Collingwood museum for a collection of photographs from Barrie, or another location.
So, in addition to cataloguing the backlog of artifact gifts, the museum is working on better defining the collection requirement, and making room for more donations in 2019.
The museum will be collecting artifact donations again in the spring, and staff still welcome emails from donors wishing to bring in artifacts once the moratorium is lifted.
Click here for contact information and more on Collingwood’s museum.
