For All the World to See: The take down

From the Desk of Brock Stafford:

Last Friday, students from the Historical Administration program, as well as Dr. Reid, assisted the library staff in the take down of the travelling exhibit, “For All the World to See”, which had been up for seven weeks in Booth Library. This exhibit has been travelling the country for four years so far, and deconstructing the exhibit, it is no wonder how it has stood up over this amount of time. Solidly constructed, meticulously labelled, and elaborately shipped, organizing this tear down took as much time as deconstructing the cases. The group managed to divide ourselves into two camps; half of the team to working on taking it down, and the other half in organizing it downstairs and placing them into the 13 crates that housed the pieces.

The deconstruction took roughly three hours to complete, which is a feat considering that the set-up took four days. Lots of physical dismantling of the heavy metal frames, careful removal of the items and images, and making sure every screw was accounted for. The teamwork with the library staff and HA helpers was a seamless experience, and the library was pleased at how efficient the work was. Meanwhile, the work downstairs of organizing was extensive, as every piece of the framing was labelled by crate, level of packing material, and place in the case.

We were not able to complete everything by the end of that day, but we saw the relief on the faces of those finishing it up on Monday. After all was said and done, it was a satisfying experience that allowed current students to not only get their hands on a professional travelling exhibit, but to see methods of storage, construction, and organization that allows this to be possible. Many lessons from this work will go into the exhibit in Booth Library in the spring, entitled “A Question of History: Public History in Illinois”.

Thanks to the Booth Library and staff for this opportunity.