Stewardship and historic houses

Even before the most recent economic slump, house museums throughout the country have been experiencing declining visitation and working with dwindling financial resources. The question of relevance and reevaluation is key, but what if the answer to “Is this house museum relevant to its community?” is “No”? And what if redeveloping a relevant experience simply isn’t feasible, practical, or affordable–as in the case of a “redundant” house museum, one that offers an experience found in one or more nearby house museums? What then?

Above all, the historic house requires responsible stewardship. While it may turn out that using a historic house as a house museum is not its best use, there are other adaptive options that can preserve the house–and the sense of place that its presence gives its community–for generations to come, even if visitors are no longer able to tour its period rooms. Some of these houses may be able to even continue to serve the community, just in different ways.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Spring 2008 Forum Journal, America’s Historic Sites at a Crossroads, presents a few hopeful suggestions for house museums in this situation. One example is the merger of Cliveden, a National Trust property in Philadelphia, with neighboring Upsala, a former house museum that is now used as Cliveden’s education center. Apart, Cliveden and Upsala told essentially the same stories. Together, the sites champion preservation, education, and economic revitalization in Philadelphia’s Germantown community. “While museum visitation has remained consistent at 3,000,” David W. Young, Cliveden’s executive director, wrote in 2008, “the number of people served has increased by over 40 percent in the last two years.”

Another example presented in the Forum Journal is the revision of the John James Audubon Center at Mill Grove in Montgomery County, PA. Originally a house museum, Mill Grove has been adapted as an exhibition space and community center, with a new museum that uses Audubon’s art as a jumping off point in the larger picture of nature conservation. The old house museum’s biggest draw, Audubon’s bedroom, has been recreated, but otherwise the space has been completely reworked to suit its new mission: to learn about nature through art.

Finally, where a house museum may not be suitably adapted into a community or welcome center, perhaps it could be adapted into an office space–or even returned to its original use as a home. By placing an easement–a legally restrictive contract to maintain at least the exterior appearance of the house–on a former house museum, it is possible to protect the house’s historic character and to continue to contribute to its community’s individual charm. Historic New England’s Stewardship Program is one example of an organization that holds easements on historic properties, allowing them to be cared for by private owners while ensuring that their character and integrity remain intact.

Few dispute the values of historic preservation, or the importance of historic buildings in the fabric of a historic community. Being a good steward for a house museum is of paramount importance. An honest evaluation of whether or not the building is best used as a museum may be difficult to undertake, but the outcome can be positive for the house and the community alike.

Historic Houses as Sources of Empowerment

Although historic house museums are experiencing a decline in foot traffic as compared to other types of museums, it may be argued that these institutions hold a unique potential for empowerment. Empowerment for whom? And how can empowerment be cultivated when fewer and fewer people enter these buildings?

Historical house museums are a source of power if they are adapted to serve the communities in which they exist. If historic sites make connections between the original homeowner (regardless of time period) and present groups, the common humans experience will be evocative.

Most people understand the concept of “home,” and historic sites can uniquely adapt to become a home to a community. By developing programs which include and edify area communities, historic houses can serve as refuge and voice for the underprivileged, the down trodden and displaced. For example, many historic house museums are located in areas with newer immigrant populations. These newcomers are no different from the droves of people who have flocked to America throughout its history. Museum programs for consideration could include exhibitions and events representing these new immigrant communities. Programs as these help to establish concrete connections between modern populations earlier immigrant people. For example, similarities could be explored between a 19th century German immigrants and a 21st century Somalians. Common experiences such as immigration, language barriers, and prejudice could create organic and profound dialogs. Allowing locals an opportunity to see their culture in a museum will reap a feeling at home, establish trust and build pride in the site.

Events geared toward the community, recruiting volunteers from the neighborhood and utilizing shared authority will solidify a museum’s relevance. Some museums are incorporating farmers’ markets, music festivals, WIC programs, free days, and the list continues. These types of programs can make a historic house a haven within a community. Yes, it is a fine line between this type of historic house museum and a community center, so museums should always remember that service to their community is only one part of their mission. With that said, these adaptive measures can work to enhance historic sites and fuel departments such a collections and/or education to grow in strength by expanding their focuses.

It must be added, that indeed not all houses were created equal! Due to the over abundance of historic house museums many people view historic sites as unnecessary and outdated. An honest analysis based on criteria should be established to decide whether a house is worth saving. If the museum is empowering a community, serving the public and making historical connections that transcend time and space, it is worth saving. If a historic house is consuming federal or private funding and they do not serve the community, these houses should be considered for easement programs to maintain their historic value. Historic preservation of buildings is important, but not every historic site is worthy of being a museum!

Interview

For my class presentation, I interviewed Diane Lee, the Collections Manager at the Connecticut Historical Society.

Collections and You

People collect for a variety of reasons: interest, consumerism, fetishes, documentation of the past, and more. Museums collect to preserve, conserve, and interpret. No matter the reason behind the collecting the bottom line is that it happens.

Who cares about 17th Century Dutch furniture, paintings, etc that were collected by a former prominent family in the Albany area? The better question is not who cares but why should people care about these collections? Museum collections preserve the past so that we do not forget who we once were. At the Hancock Shaker Village in Pittsfield, Massachusetts their mission drives their collecting policy. They “brings the Shaker story to life and preserves it for future generations.” They have a difficult time of relating their collections to the every day visitor. They attempt to relate similar themes from the Shakers to modern day themes such as being green.

The Shakers made beautiful furniture, most people know that. When you visit the Hancock Shaker Village you walk into period rooms where the Shakers once lived and see artifacts that the Shakers once used. There is an eerie calmness in the air as you wander from room to room filled with artifacts but no people. How can Hancock and other historic house museums bring to life the stories of the past? There are interpretive paneling and interpreters at hand but that does not do it justice. We see the collections and we might obtain a small understanding of them but do we really see how their collection relates to us?

How can historic house museums change to better serve the public and relate personally each and every museum visitor? Are re-enactments the key? Are costumed interpreters what needs to be done? It all seems a bit dated. If we can find a way for every visitor to leave a museum with a better understanding of the collections then I believe that we truly are here for the public good.

Making Collections Accessible

Most museums with collections routinely keep up to 90% of their objects in storage at any given time. Considering the current trend of making museums more audience friendly, should museums then make their collections more accessible and open to the public? How can they do so in an engaging and exciting way?

I believe that museums must make their collections available to every and any one interested in them in order to successfully serve their communities. If most museums state in their mission that they desire to educate their audience, selectively granting access to their collections contrasts with this ideal. Restricting access to collections not only creates a barrier between the museum and its audience, but it also limits the spread of knowledge, therein weakening their purpose as a public trust.

With a little ingenuity, museums can overcome this barrier while keeping their objects and storage space secure. Some institutions have begun digitizing their collections. This method allows any one with internet access to browse and observe whichever objects are available. While this method typically only grants passive engagement, it does allow the visitor to examine and research objects they otherwise might not know exist. Other museums, such as the Connecticut Historical Society, offer behind the scenes tours of their collections or willingly offer to retrieve any artifact that a visitor is interested in viewing. The audience can then view the object while interacting with a human being and staff member.

While these approaches do limit the available context of an object, they are nevertheless an interesting beginning at incorporating collections into the concept of the audience-centered museum.

The Art of Manipulation

In essence, what museum professionals are practicing is the art of manipulation–we manipulate what they see, how they see it, what context we put it in, where we place things, how we place things, what they read, if an exhibit is conducive to interacting socially, what they can buy, what they can eat, and, I believe most importantly we manipulate objects to show people what we think is important about them.

Manipulation is neither good nor bad–although it has a more popular negative connotation to it, it’s like the worlds that Falk & Dierking point out in The Museum Experience; “Education” and “Entertainment” all have connotations to them that we usually adhere to. The book and its authors argue that museum professionals and visitors should widen their interpretation of those words.

However, the book actively promotes the manipulation of visitors to better enjoy their museum experience by giving them, in essence, what they want. While one could argue whether or not this is good or bad, I have to wonder whether or not museum professionals are actively aware to their own experiences, whether it be personal, social, or physical when they are designing content for visitors. Is designing museums for a specific response out of visitors a good thing? Is this manipulation or molding of visitors something that museum professionals should fight? Or, should we be learning the art of manipulation to better suit the visitor and museum’s need?

The Holiday Question: Programming for Expectations

Each visitor that sets foot into a museum carries with them a unique set of understandings and expectations that impact how he or she view their museum experience. This is related to why someone chooses to visit a museum – usually some combination of educational and entertainment-motivated reasoning.

For the museum professional, though, it can be difficult to balance a line between a dedication to education (as evidenced by AAM’s Excellence and Equity) and presenting an entertaining leisure-time activity. While many fear “Disney-ification,” in The Museum Experience, John Falk and Lynn Dierking note that most people recognize that theme parks and museums serve different purposes. Still, it is imperative that museums listen and respond to their audience’s expectations and wishes while still promoting educational goals. But then what about holidays?

In class we have talked about Candlelight Evening at The Farmers’ Museum as an example of people wanting to experience the “Christmas that never was.” Visitors have romanticized views of an old-fashioned Christmas that simply didn’t exist – in reality, for many years, especially in New England, it was often a quiet holiday spent at home. Still visions of decked halls and carolers and figgy puddings draw visitors to the event. The museum creates the image and experience their audience wants.

And holiday expectations aren’t just limited to Christmas. While interviewing an educator at the Strong National Museum of Play, she mentioned programming for the museum’s annual Halloween party which includes a “tattoo parlor” and various holiday crafts, as well as trick-or-treating in a safe environment. But is a holiday party educative?

By listening to audience expectations and needs a museum can begin to develop lasting relationships with visitors. By meeting preliminary needs, such as providing a safe environment for children or a beautiful, memorable evening at Christmas, a museum can open its doors to new visitors and pave the way for future visits. So certainly education should be considered in everything a museum does, but programming to meet visitor expectations is also a worthwhile investment in time and resources.

100% Satisfaction Not Always Best for the Audience

The AAM’s Excellence and Equity highlights the importance of museums expanding their role as educational institutions, especially in terms of culturally diverse audiences.  Roy Rosenzweig’s and David Thelen’s Presence of the Past: Popular Uses of History in American Life attempts to study the ways in which Americans think about the past.  With these two publications flanking the discussion of audience centered museums, the term becomes much more difficult to define and execute.  How can a museum remain audience centered with a nation that is continually growing more culturally and demographically diverse? And is it important for a museum to remain completely audience centered? Can they maintain their mission and goals at the same time?

The American public is comfortable with museums.  They put museums in a safe little box where nothing presented to them is challenging to their perceptions or ideals.  The exhibitions have been weaned down to their most political correctness and the public can ingest them without analysis. Right? WRONG.

It can be argued that it is okay if visitors do not leave a museum 100% satisfied.  Yes, the visitors should have a great time and an excellent experience, the museum should be clean and tidy, there should be adequate restrooms, and the staff should be kind and helpful.  But perhaps visitors are less than 100% satisfied with their visit because they met an unexpected challenge along the way.  They were asked to think.  Museums should run away from the romanticized view of history.  It is not the history that people connect with; it is not their past.  Museums should be comfortable with pushing their visitors to examine their present in view of the past.  Museums do not have to just be preservers of the past.  They can play a role in the development of public thought and education. By telling and forcing people to think about the underrepresented views of history, their history, museums can remain important, vital educational institutions in their communities.

Audience Centered Museums: The Unmitigated Expereince

Both in the readings for class and in my interview, I came across the phrase “unmitigated experience” in relation to one of the ways that visitors can take in a museum. To me an “unmitigated experience” is an experience where the museum does not tell the visitor any information, but instead lets him/her view the objects, and decide for himself/herself what the meaning behind them is. I have two problems, or rather questions related to this: Can a museum experience ever truly be unmitigated? Then secondly, Should a museum experience be completely unmitigated.

First, if a museum is the one creating the exhibit and laying out the placement of objects, isn’t the experience already mitigated?   The museum is influencing not only what the visitors are seeing but also the context in which they are seeing it.   A pair of scissors in the garden can create a completely different narrative than a pair of scissors in a sewing room.   Unless objects are just placed in glass cases around the room, visitors interpretations of their meanings are always going to be influenced by what they see and the context they see the object within.   If you throw in labels the question gets even more confusing, which leads to my second question.

Should museum offer completely unmitigated experiences?   If museums are educational institutions that are trusted for being very factual, do they have a responsibility to try and prevent people from misinterpreting what they see? There are plenty of objects that a person can see and have no idea what they are used for, so in turn draw a incorrect assumption about what they are and what their purpose was.   As educational institutions do museums have the responsibility to make sure this does not happen, if at all possible.

Both of these questions, especially the last one, got me thinking very hard, and I came to the conclusion that maybe a person drawing a wrong conclusion is not the end of the world, but in fact represents something good.  I had a few reasons for this conclusion.  While taking to the museum professional I was interviewing, she said that one of the main educational goals of her museum was to get people thinking critically about the world around them. This makes sense to me, people should question what they see.  Thus, by letting people observe objects without labels, museums are forcing people to think critically about what they see and draw a conclusion.   Furthermore, she said something that really stuck home with me.  She said that in the end its about sparking interest. Its about getting people interested in what they see so they want to learn more.   That resonated with me strongly. If an unmitigated experience challenges people, gets them thinking, asking questions, and looking for answers, I think that has a stronger and better impact on the person and society than simply presenting facts. By inspiring people to think and learn on their own, we as museum people are sending people out into the world with skills that are continually useful and applicable in all circumstances.

The truth is important and people trust museums to give them that, but maybe even more important is teaching people how to be critical thinkers and analyze the world around themselves.

When is it really ok to change your Mission?

A mission statement is the corner stone of a museum, dictating collections, programming and governance and ideally defining the essence of the museum itself. If that is so, how then can it also be a living document, subject to internal and external necessities to change? One reason to alter a mission is in preparation for re-accreditation usually as a result of a self study. The Gaston County Museum of Art and History in North Carolina run by Director Elizabeth Dampier, is currently undergoing that process. The current mission is acknowledged as being too broad. By using community focus groups along with staff and board surveys they were able to begin the process of self analysis, which will hopefully lead to a reformed, more focused, mission. That being said the essence of the mission will remain the same, what has changed is the specificity. The staff input, the community involvement even the board retreat to discuss the entire strategic plan, all demonstrate the importance of the mission to this museum. Every one on staff or on the board may not be able to recite the full paragraph mission statement, but Dampier points out that it is “the essence of the mission that becomes a part of your thought process” and in my mind, that is the value of an effective mission.

So what happens if the process of review creates a fundamental change in the essence of the mission? Some of the many accepted reasons to alter a mission statement include; reorganization or restructuring, a change in leadership, a change in governance, a shift in audience or the cultural landscape, or even pressures from the external environment. When a museum relies so heavily upon a mission statement to guide so much of its policy, where do you draw the line during a self evaluation. What if external pressures such as the economy or new leadership recommend a fundamental change in the mission? When is changing your mission ok in tough times, and when do you use your current mission to think of new and different ways to overcome the obstacle you face?