Front Line Staff are Valuable

I would hazard to say that the front line staff are among the most valuable staff a museum or historic site can have. Not only do they work the cash registers, which bring in the money for the site, but they can make or break an experience for the visitor.

These staff members give the tours, talking about the artifacts in our collections. They tell the visitor why the site and its collection is important to the community's heritage and culture. Often times, as part of 'other duties', they assist curators in mounting exhibits, they keep things clean, including the toilets, they provide security for each other, the site, and the valuable collection.

And yet, they are often the lowest paid people on staff, if they are paid at all...

We need to start appreciating these folks better than we are currently. Paying them better would be nice, but not every site has a fabulous budget, in fact, many of our sites run on no budgets at all. We can work around this by providing better resources to the front line staff members to do their jobs better, maybe to even live their lives better.

 - Are your staff members university students? Apart from many government programs that you can apply to, to help pay them a wage for the summer, could working for the site earn them university credit?

- Do your staff wear historic costume? Do they show an interest in building and owning their own kit? You could run workshops during the winter months to help them build accurate pieces of clothing. Staff who have their own clothes take pride in those clothes. They learn how they were worn and why. They also tend to stick around as occasional volunteers after working for the site.

- Do you have the resources to help front line staff develop accurate and informative tours? Can you offer them time to research, other staff to help guide them in good directions? A librarian on staff can do wonders for the overall quality of knowledge production for the site. Developing good relationships with community librarians also helps, if you don't have a library on site. Schedule research trips to other sites in the community to see how other sites work, share resources.

- How do you engage the community? Are you sitting back, waiting for them to come to the site, either as a visitor or as a potential employee? Can you develop better methods of engagement with the communities, yes plural, in your area? Who are you missing from your community outreach? What stories aren't being told because of those missing community members?

- Finally, how do you develop a cadre of volunteers?

Recently, a group of living historians approached a small historic site with a solid interpretation plan and an offer to animate the site for a weekend. A group of hard working, dedicated volunteers put together a scenario of a Tailor and Bookbinder's shops in an over/under building. They gathered together all the things you would find in those environments, the living history interpreters not only knew the information that pertained to their chosen persona, they also intimately researched the site and the local community. Over the weekend event, the number of visitors rose significantly than during regular days opening. The visitors also stayed longer and were more engaged with the interpretation programming.

View of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Dominic Serres 1765, Art Gallery of Nova Scotia

I think it behoves a site and it's site director to develop these relationships. Better quality interpretation programing can come out of good working relationships with the community the site is surrounded by. Don't let the only time community members visit your site be when they have company in from out of town, and it's the 'touristy' thing to do. Give them reasons to be at the site all season long.

Interpretation: Setting a table, setting a scene

I grew up in a house where the kitchen table served as both work surface and dining table. Living in a Q (private married quarters), meant we lived quite closely, the house was small with no room for a separate dining room. My grandfather thought is was important that we learn proper table manners though, and at meal times, the table would be cleaned off and set with a table cloth and all the required dishware and cutlery. His reasoning, so that we would not embarrass ourselves if having to share a dinner table in a more polite setting. We learned how to hold all our cutlery in the European fashion, which fork to use with which course, and how to consume alcohol properly.

These skills have come in handy in my adult life, as I feel comfortable in any setting now, with any dining companion. Skills that have helped further a military career, as one of the main aspects of our social life at the moment is attending Mess functions on a monthly basis. Seeing that P can function in a very political setting has possibly paved the way for finishing out his career in a more favourable light. At this point, it is far more than just being able to do his primary job. He has to be able to socialize with the higher ups perfectly to be accepted into that social circle.

This has been a long standing requirement for higher ranks in the military for hundreds of years. Up until fairly recently, to obtain such ranks, your family bought them for you. Establishing the soldier in a social order not available to many. Proving that you could afford to live the expected lifestyle of the rank. In living history, I have used our modern experiences of growing up and living a military career to reflect how I interact in my role as a servant to officers. It has become second nature to me to set a table properly, how to interact with the men I am serving, how to blend in to the background and make things happen for them to do their jobs easier.

Recently, I was asked by a friend how far these niceties of class would extend? They were organizing an event at a house/workshop for business and trades people. Would these people have used a tablecloth? what sort of dishware would they have used? And it got us thinking about how much we take for granted in our cross-over modern and historical lives. Conversations around how dirty a work table could get, especially if it were the only table in a shared work and living space, how quickly it could become 'clean' enough for eating. I thought of the table in the soldier's barracks at Ticonderoga, and how dirty it has become through years of use and abuse, cleaning muskets, doing dirty soldier's chores, and how quickly a fresh tablecloth could clean it up enough for a meal.

Jack Sprat, c.1800. collections.museums-sheffield.org.uk

what a great cartoon of a well known subject matter. Working class, for sure, but with a tablecloth. There are enough historical images kicking about that backs up my thoughts that a work table could quickly become the dining table with a clean tablecloth. Now, I'm not terribly worried about the condition of the tablecloth for most instances. I'm not one to bring my best linen out into the field, but hand-me-down linens, maybe with a few small holes or stains, but clean, now there's the ticket for my working class or frontier officer's table. After all, we are not entertaining the King of England!

I have come to that conclusion by studying archaeological records of fortifications with British garrisons. Lynne Sussman, in her 1978 paper British Military Tableware, 1760-1830 states, "It has been possible, using the large samples from Fort Beausejour, New Brunswick, as well as evidence from other military sites, to select tea and dinner services that were used for regimental messes during the period 1760-1830" (p.93). Sussman notes that the common soldier may have been issued a tin plate and cup, or more likely would have been given an allowance to purchase said implements, and that they may have been simply wood (p93-94). The officer's mess, on the other hand, seems to have been fully equipped with cooking and dinner service, paid for by the officer's of the regiment, and style was often dictated by the highest ranking member, the Colonel. Cooking and dining services were purchased through factory wholesale warehouses and may have actually been 'seconds' of popular styles in the non military world. Finds include pieces of redware and stoneware, then as fashion shifted, creamware, pearlware, and transferware such as blue willow are featured in the historical archaeological record. Sussman also backs up my thoughts on class structure stating, "An officer in the British army was expected to maintain himself, in a style appropriate to an officer and a gentleman, at his own expense", she also notes that as far back as the eighteenth-century mess dues were collected, "graduated according to rank, for maintenance of the regimental mess. Most mess furnishings, including the tableware, were purchased collectively by the officers" (p.95). Similar to our modern mess structure, furnishing, and tableware. Sussman also notes an early form of 'regimental' tableware, at Fort Lennox, Quebec, creamware that bears the transfer printed insignia of the 13th Regiment of Foot (p.95), similar to our dinner service at our local mess, which sports the markings of the Canadian Armed Forces.

Lois Feister undertook a similar investigation at Crown Point New york and published her paper, Material Culture of the British Soldier at "His Majesty's Fort of Crown Point" on Lake Champlain New York, 1759-1783, in 1984. Feister's conclusions echo those of Sussman, bringing up potential difference in enlisted men and officer's dining accoutrements, stating "historians were confident of 'wooden trenchers; pewter spoons, knives, and forks; and horn cups as having been the primary personal items of culinary ware" (p124). Feister notes that, "one of the primary characteristics, however, of North American 18th-century domestic sites, even of apparently low economic status, is the presence of British manufactured earthenware, quoting Stanley South, 'from port town ruins to town house mansions to frontier forts and Indian villages have similar groups of ceramic types present at similar periods of time" (p124).

This tells me that no matter what, fashionibility was key no matter the economic class one found oneself in. You did your very best to present respectability given what you had at hand.

Feister goes on to explain how the archaeological evidence at Crown Point "contributed significant data toward a better understanding of the material culture of the British soldier in Colonial America" (p125). She explains how the barracks blocks were constructed and used, "revealing a standard of living at least comparable to that found on 18th-century domestic sites, despite the isolated location of this British fort", allowing even the common soldier to obtain "such domestic goods as were necessary for a way of life that went beyond the tin plate and mug" (p127).

Evidence reveals how the barracks rooms were used as well, noting "Mrs. Jane Ross's room in the soldier's barracks where she cooked food for the (mess of nine) soldiers. Her room being referred to as the 'mess room', indicating that it was customary to cook in the barracks rather than in a separate building" (p128). this backs up several theories that possibly, in regular eighteenth-century life, a single room with a fireplace could be inhabited by a whole family, undertaking all the daily taskings required to live a quality life.
The officer's had an even further separation of spaces, having a space set aside and referred to as the 'dining room', apart from sleeping quarters (p129). Archaeological findings of tableware included redware, creamware and some stoneware fragments appearing outside every barracks unit, suggesting widespread use. Porcelain teaware were found clustered behind the end of the third and into the fourth unit of the barracks block, suggesting occupation of higher status individuals, the officers (p129).

Feister goes on to explain that all activities of daily life occurred in every unit of the barracks, but that with the focus on certain types of finds, each unit may have been separated into dining and sleeping room activities (p131). I feel that just this brief exploration of daily life through food helps to substantiate my feelings of setting the table for dinner service. Closer examination of the historical record can help to determine items issued, purchased, and used by people in a given living situation, as well as the foods consumed, and how they were cooked and served. All of this can add to the overall interpretation of a given site, as it can break down barriers between the visiting public and the interpreter. All of us eat, many of us cook, and each of us knows what smells good! Conversations can be started based on very few sensory cues.

Bibliography

Feister, Lois M. "Material Culture of the British Soldier at 'His Majesty's Fort of Crown Point' on Lake Champlain, New Yory, 1759-1783." Journal of Field Archaeology, vol 11, No. 2 Summer (1984): 123-132.

Sussman, Lynne. "British Military Tableware, 1760-1830." Historical Archaeology, vol.12 (1978): 93-104.

Regency on a Shoe String: A New Frock

My American friends have been asking where I buy my fabrics. I am not much of a shopper, I really hate being out shopping for things, I tend to be the type that goes into a store with an idea, and quickly scan until I see it, buy it, then back home. We are royalty at doing Costco in under 15 minutes.
Shopping for fabric is a whole different ballgame though. I love me some fabric stores, and each one has a different personality. Fabricville is a chain store in eastern Canada. Also known as Fabricland in Ontario. It's laid out so new fabrics are at the front of the store, and they slowly move to the back of the store as new fabrics are brought in. They end up on the 'wall', heavily discounted, and this is where you can find the best pieces. The wall is usually a disaster area. Women root, throw bolts around, generally make an entire mess of it, and that's the fun. It also gave me a steady job to do each time I have worked there for money. If I wasn't on cash, or cutting, I was tidying. Not all of my paychecks went towards fabric, but I did drop a few dollars there over the years. Most times when I buy fabric, it tells me what it wants to be made into long before I leave the store, wall fabrics are different. I tend to buy the whole bolt of something if it is a 'good' fabric, sometimes I have bought whole collections of fabrics, which is why I ended up with several kinds of black linen with white stripes. If anything, they will make good linings.

So most of this project is made from stuff I have bought from the wall. I have spent no more than 3$/metre CDN on each piece. The two wools I will be using came from other project's leftovers, one even started life in my care from the 'free love bin' at NSCAD University, our version of the take one penny leave one penny bin. So a chunk of wool for free, yes, Yoink!

Linen Stripe on the left, wool check from the free love bin for the Spencer on the right

My new frock came from one of those three, maybe four different pieces of black with white stripe linen off the wall. I've given some of it away, but pulled out the pieces I had left and figured out I might have enough of one pattern of stripe for a frock, and the smaller piece of different stripe pattern I would use as lining for my Spencer.
Once my stays were bound off, and I got a paying client's project ready to send off in the mail, I started the new gown. I quickly draped a pattern for myself, but honestly, there is no harm in using one of the many good quality patterns out there on the market (*cough* Laughing Moon). I just didn't have one at hand, and didn't feel like buying one, and could do the project by cutting my own. Regency is not complicated. It's basically a nightgown.

I went on Pinterest and just started looking, looking at seam placement, and styles, and pulled up a few EXTANT garments to use as reference. It's important to not copy other reenactor's clothes when you are making new clothing for yourself. You don't know what corners they cut, or what they didn't see when they built their garments. Always go to the primary source if you can. You will learn something new every time you do, or at least I do...I use Pinterest a lot.

Here is my little fitted linen bodice that will become my lining for my gown

There are a lot of seams on this project that I whipped up on machine. I needed this to be a quick project too, as I have two clients waiting in the wings for new clothing themselves, so this project cannot take up a lot of my time. I have made the decision to do any seam that doesn't show by machine, and save my hand work for things that will show. There are also a couple of spots inside where I have used the serger to finish my seam allowances, in case this goes on to live in another home and I no longer have control over it's laundering.

I thought for sure I had taken more construction images, but I guess I was lazy. The fashion fabric was hand stitched to the linen bodice. The style is a bib front, with the lining buttoning at the centre front, and the bib buttoning at the front shoulder strap seams. The skirt is two and a half widths of fabric, with the half width being in the front, the two full widths are gathered into the back. I had wanted to have a pleat or two at the hem, like is fashionable for the period, used to hold the hem out from the body, but I just didn't have enough cloth. Instead, I put a ten inch wide hem facing on the skirt, using the same linen I lined the bodice in. This will have to do. Buttons are all from the button box, vintage shell buttons from last century sometime. The skirt comes to my ankles, good for walking around the farm in mud season, which in Nova Scotia starts in October, and goes until June. Plus, it will show off the sexy new boots Margaret Hubley is making for me.

I began on July 31st, took Saturday and Sunday off, and finished late yesterday. So in all, four days of easy work, afternoons only. In the morning, I have been writing my dissertation.

I started the Spencer today, and promise there will be more construction shots.