Emergency

Monday afternoon I was cataloguing some photographs when my boss, Kathy Shannon, the Executive Director, came into my office. "Leslie, I need to talk to you," she said while walking toward object storage in the Pit.

Remember what the Pit looked like?


The Pit houses oil field tools and equipment as well as cultural and historical objects (formerly on display in the West Wing) on a series of metal bookshelves. Also in the Pit was maintenance equipment and defunct exhibit materials. Cleaning out the Pit and moving object storage to another location has been on my list of "To Do" since I started here.

Kathy took me into the Pit that afternoon and told me that the collection objects were being threatened.

Above those bookshelves, you see, is a large piece of canvas which hangs between object storage and the pipeline airplane exhibit in the North Wing above.

The painted backdrop, backed by masonite, behind the airplane had slipped its anchors and was presumably resting precariously against non-load bearing walls.



Needless to say, this news was a shock to me. Should the backdrop fall forward, it would hit the plane. Should the backdrop fall backward, it would crush the exhibit wall behind it, possibly hitting some collection objects in that area. Should the backdrop continue to slide, the canvas floor/celing might cave in on top of the collection objects below in the Pit. None of those scenarios were good.

So, Kathy and I developed a plan: Spend Tuesday cleaning out the maintenance and exhibit materials. Use Wednesday to move the collection away from the canvas ceiling and underneath the concrete one.

Tuesday, I helped the Facilities Supervisor and his assistant clear out some wooden shelves. In the afternoon, Lauren and Whitney showed up to help. We continued to clean -- removing trash, setting aside collection objects, and sweeping. By the end of the afternoon, we were in a good place to start moving boxes and objects.



And no, it's not snowing in the Pit. That's the reflections off the dust in the air after moving, cleaning, and sweeping!

Wednesday morning, most of the Museum's staff helped shuttle boxes of collection boxes to the wooden shelves. We then moved the loose objects to tables. When we ran out of space there, we laid some on foam on the floor and even moved some shelving units to under the concrete for more storage!





Many hands made light work -- we were done in about an hour!

Now, you may see many issues in the images above: wooden shelves, objects on the floor, no gloves, etc. As this was an emergency situation, I was mainly concerned about getting the objects out of immediate harm's way. Most of those objects, such as the oil field tools and equipment, have seen worse conditions than what they are currently under. In the next few weeks, I hope to move those objects to a more permanent storage home in the Museum.