This is also being done at NMAH with the conservation of the Star Spangled
Banner.  This is temporary project-specific laboratory and is very popular.
I know every time I have gone there has been a crowd of people there
fascinated by the process and the extremely deliberate and painstaking work
being done.

Here at the Virginia Museum of Natural History we recently completed the
design for a new building that contains three laboratories to be "on
display."  They are adjacent to each other along one hall and each will have
a glass wall with blinds that can be closed when necessary.  The labs to be
on display are vert paleo (the visitors will be watching lots of dino and
fossil whale prep), the SEM (where visitors will see on monitors what people
are working on in the SEM and can communicate via speakers of some sort that
can be turned off if the researcher needs uninterrupted quiet), and
conservation/collections processing (where visitors will see all kinds of
collections-related tasks going on).  We are all very excited about this
opportunity to educate our visitors on what goes on in a museum every day -
from the exciting to the repetitive.  We currently host an open house each
year where visitors can visit all of the behind-the-scenes areas and it is
extremely successful.  We also do brief tours for unscheduled yet very
interested visitors as well as longer tours for those who tend to plan
ahead - school groups, scout troops, etc.  Even so, much of the public
remains uninformed about what exactly museum people do all day.  We see this
as just one more opportunity to educate them.

Elizabeth Moore

Dr. Elizabeth A. Moore
Curator of Collections and Archaeology
Virginia Museum of Natural History
1001 Douglas Avenue
Martinsville, VA  24112




----- Original Message -----
From: "Kathy Mancuso" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, March 06, 2002 12:20 AM
Subject: Re: Viewing Collections Work Rooms


> This method is currently being used at the National Museum of American
> History with "Julia Child's Kitchen."  They have signs up in the exhibit
at
> each workstation saying things like "cataloging." (Kind of like labels at
> the National Zoo?)  This is, however, temporary, and involves about 5 or
10
> people.  Sorry my memory is a bit vague on details--I know that there are
> some people from NMAH on list who probably can speak to this better than I
> can.
>
> Kathy Mancuso
>
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