Welcome to the second installment of our miniseries on Nishimura 3746, a Japanese midget submarine. We’re deep diving into an on-going project to resupport this one-of-a-kind vessel. Check out the first post in the series to learn about Nishimura’s history and how it arrived at the Museum.
The purpose of the project is to lift the sub onto a custom cradle and move it to a more accessible location. The sub currently rests on its keel and is supported by several blocks. A proper support will protect the hull, provide safe access, and bonus, can be used as an exhibit mount when the time comes to display it!Read more
Does anyone else look at this submarine and think of the Beatles, or is it just me? If we painted it, I think it could definitely pass for a (less artsy) version of the Yellow Submarine.
Well, soon, this object is going to undergo a pretty big move and we are majorly excited about it. To that end, we have been doing a lot of prep work to get the object ready, and we wanted to share it with you!Read more
The Mariners’ Museum and Park’s own Paige Schmidt (left) working as part of the Wooden Artifacts Group Programs Chairs
If you’ve ever read any of our blog posts about conservation, taken a lab tour, or talked to a conservator at any museum, you might have heard one of us mention “AIC” or the American Institute for Conservation. AIC is a national organization with thousands of members, including conservators and other museum professionals. It is a vital way for conservators to share information. So for this blog post, we thought we’d tell you a bit about what AIC is, how it helps us inform conservation decisions at The Mariners’ Museum and Park, and what we do at the Museum to contribute to AIC.
AIC holds an annual conference, which is usually located in a different city every year, giving conservators opportunities to not only attend lectures, but visit museums and conservation labs across the country. The conservation department at the Mariners’ makes an effort to present any new research produced at the annual conference. (You may have read about unique treatments we have been conducting in the conservation department in this blog before.) We make a concentrated effort to share our results at the annual conference, so that other conservators can benefit from our research. Even if experiments do not yield the results we were hoping for, the information helps other conservators when making treatment decisions. Additionally, we often find colleagues from other museums who want to collaborate in continued research through AIC conferences. Read more
Figure 3. A degrading area of wood surrounding a fastener hole in one of Princess Carolina’s timbers. Image courtesy of The Mariners’ Museum and Park.
Hi! My name is Christy and I’m a conservation intern here at the Batten Conservation Complex. Over the past eight months I’ve been working on a research project at The Mariners’ Museum and Park for the final year of my graduate program at Durham University. This project has involved a condition analysis and investigation of potential treatments for the Princess Carolina timbers which are currently deteriorating because of acid formation.
Although my time as an intern is almost up, we have recently found out that I’ll be able to continue my work here next year! The Mariners’ has been named one of six museums to receive the Kress Conservation Fellowship which provides funding for a post-graduate fellow at the Museum. I will serve as that fellow as I continue the exciting research I’m about to tell you all about!Read more
The brush was removed from the starboard gun carriage, covered in mud and hard concretion.
Although my blogs to date give a very Dahlgren-centric view of what I do, there is far more to USS Monitor than just its guns. And I love having such a huge variety of objects to work on! In addition to big metal objects, we find a wide variety of organic objects, ranging from the wooden sides of the gun carriages to rope packing seals to a wool coat. We also have a number of brushes from on board the ship, including a nearly complete bench brush that I’ve been working on!
This brush was originally found stuck to one of the gun carriages, covered in mud and concretion – the hard, rocky material that forms around corroding iron. Although the brush itself is entirely organic – wood and fiber – it was so close to the iron of the gun carriage that it was caught inside concretion formed by that object. As a result, it didn’t look like much to begin with.Read more
