CHM archives intern Ashley Clark worked with archivist Julie Wroblewski to process the papers of John A. McDermott, a local leader in race relations and urban affairs from the 1960s into the 1990s. This past fall, I had the opportunity to process the John A. McDermott papers at the Chicago History Museum. I had processed More
As part of Monday Night Nitrates, our new weekly photograph series, the Chicago History Museum collections staff is blogging about the process of digitizing approximately 35,000 nitrate negatives. In this post, former CHM photographer Joseph Aaron Campbell writes about the painstaking task of converting analog negatives to digital images. The task of digitizing this nitrate More
Candace Bey is one of the Museum’s gallery engagement associates for Race: Are We So Different? In this blog post, she reflects on the thoughtful interactions she has had with our young visitors. I spend my days listening. People ask me simple things like “Where’s the bathroom?” and muse about what the Museum should offer More
On November 26, 2017, the Secret Lives of Objects exhibition closed after a three-and-a-half-year run, requiring Museum staff to return the exhibition’s artifacts to storage. One of the largest was a Model P motor buggy sold by Sears, Roebuck & Company around 1910. To move large, heavy, or cumbersome objects off display and transport them More
CHM collections intern Catrien Egbert recaps her work cataloging the Museum’s massive Decorative and Industrial Arts collection and highlights some memorable finds. If you’re like me, you’ve always wondered what treasures a museum’s collection might hold. Last summer, I had the opportunity to find out as the collections team continued its endeavor to catalog the More