Learn how to protect your “Tusculum Treasures.” The Museums of Tusculum College will offer special presentations at the President Andrew Johnson Museum and Library (Old College) to help alumni learn who to care for their Tusculum treasures in their own home.
Myers Brown, curator of extension services at the Tennessee State Museum, will give two 30-minute presentations on the care of clothing, memorabilia and decorative arts during the morning. In the afternoon, Amy Collins, archivist at East Tennessee State University’s Archives of Appalachia, will give two 30-minute presentations on the care of paper, photographs and films. Do-it-yourself boxes of archival supplies will be available to alumni to take home.
The presentations will alternate with 30-minute screenings of historic films of Tusculum College campus life in the 1920s-70s. The films were unreadable a year ago and represent an on-going process to migrate antiquated media onto new media. The first film, college scenes of 1930, will be shown at 9 a.m. and college scenes from 1940-42 will be shown at 10:30 a.m.
In the afternoon, a film featuring college scenes from 1940, 1948-1952 May Day activities and basketball from 1950 will be shown at 1 p.m., and at 2:30 p.m., the film will feature Tusculum College students/fire department in 1970, scenes from the play, “Blazing the Trail from 1969, and scenes from the Heritage Trust Christmas Tour of Homes in 1970.
The final film, to be shown at 4 pm., will feature campus scenes from 1929-30 and May Day activities in 1948 and 1951.
October is National Archives Month, and will be commemorated by the museum with the “Preserving Your Traditions” exhibit. The display will describe what constitutes an archive and will provide information on how individuals can care for personal collections.
The exhibit will feature hands-on items like records, books, photographs and other material maintained in the Tusculum College Archives. Trophies, photographs, scrapbooks and documents will reveal campus life of a by-gone era and testify that alumni, students, faculty and staff are long remembered for their contributions to campus. Visitors will have the rare opportunity to handle objects spanning the past 100 years of Tusculum history. By wearing the prerequisite white gloves of an archivist and handling the objects, visitors will learn about the results of improper storage and enhance their appreciation of historic items.
There is no charge for the event.