Last summer, CHM collections intern Cara Caputo worked with collections manager Britta Keller Arendt to continue the ongoing inventory of the Decorative and Industrial Arts collection. This led her to discover just how much investigation working with the collection entails. CHM publications interns Lily Stachowiak and Brendan Narko helped organize and publish this blog post. More
This summer, CHM collections intern Brittany Boettcher worked with senior collections manager Britta Keller Arendt to inventory items in our Decorative and Industrial Arts collection. In this blog post, Boettcher highlights some Civil War artifacts and explains how differences between Confederate bills answered the questions she had about where and when they were printed. CHM More
Within the first twenty years of the Chicago History Museum’s establishment in 1856 (then the Chicago Historical Society), the building burned down twice. Since then, it has relocated, expanded, and experienced other minor emergencies, as can happen with any building over time. As an institution that actively collects and preserves Chicago history, however, it’s in our best interest 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