Future Research Source

The California Academy of Sciences has an amazing web catalog of the objects in their collection. It will be a great resource for our future research.

Here is a link to their Oceanic textiles.

More Books

I've added to our little research library in the museum workroom:

Journeys: The International Journal of Travel and Travel Writing; Vol. 12

Collecting Native America 1870-1960, Krech III and Hail

Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century

Museums, Anthropology and Imperial Exchange, Henare

Passionate Hobby: Rudolf Frederick Haffenreffer and the King Philip Museum, Krech III

Genealogical Rabbit Holes

I am struggling to fill out George's family tree. In the last week we have found a great deal concerning his father (Amos Foster Beardsley) and a fair but concerning his Grandfather (Amos Beardsley).

I have fallen down the rabbit hole of trying to put together Amos Beardsley's life. It started with the seemingly simple objective of finding out his wife's name. My assumption is her maiden name is Foster, but I cannot find anything about her. Maybe Foster is her mother's name??

The search is complicated by the proliferation of Amos Beardsley's in Derbyshire in the 1800s. Not only are their numerous unrelated Amos's, it seems that it was quite a common name within the family (Amos Foster Beardsley had at least one cousin with a similar name). 

Here is a quick snapshot of what I have thus far: 

I found this resource that indicates that an English surgeon by the name of Amos Beardsley died in 1901. It seems reasonable to assume, for now, that this is our Grandfather. 

Sigh...back to the googling...

Books Available in the Museum

The following books are available for your pursuing in the museum workroom. Many are checked out from the library for my thesis research, some are my personal books. I don't want anyone to borrow them over night. You can take them during office hours for photocopying but they must be back before the end of the day.

Cannibal Tours and Glass Boxes, Ames.

Native Cultures of the Pacific Islands, Oliver.

Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, Pratt.

Ladies of the Grand Tour, Dolan

The Grand Tour, Hibbert.

Ethnic and Tourist Arts: Cultural Expressions from the Fourth World, Graburn.

They Heyday of Natural History, Barber

The Blessings of a Good Thick Skirt: Women Travelers and Their World, Russell.

New Research for Team Parallel lives

OK, Dr. C and I have found a ton of new information regarding GFB. Neither of us has had any  time to process this info or really interpret it. I'm passing it along in it's raw form to you guys so you can get started sifting through it:

EDIT: AFB = Amos Foster Beardsley, GFB's father.

Could this be a reference to GFB's father?

AFB owned shares in the Penole Gold, Silver, and Copper Company

More evidence that AFB was a botanist of some regard. 

 Convention of Fruit Growers. Pretty sure this is Amos, even though it says "Mr. FA Beardsley"

Passenger List from Panama.

Another Passenger list. This one says FA Beardsley, so may not be our guy but I'm feeling pretty confident that he is.

Hoyt, Pidwell and Co. Wool and Hide advertisement. Not sure what to make of this. 

Pidwell and Co. The name changes.

J Street Flour Store. 

Cases of Smut (as in wheat)

Big Beardsley Mine. No clue if this is our family

Beardsley Mine history. Google Book.

New Research for Team Full Circle/Sojourn(?)

OK, Dr. C and I have found a ton of new information regarding GFB. Neither of us has had any  time to process this info or really interpret it. I'm passing it along in it's raw form to you guys so you can get started sifting through it:

Beardsley, G. F., Cammel,[sic] California, of about 30 volumes on mining and metallurgy for the library of the College of Mining. (given to UC 1918-19)  I don't have a link for this yet. 

Address "Care of Wellman and Peck" (Mining Magazine December 1905)

GF Donated Fungi Specimens to Stanford  

Could this British Columbia trip account for the walrus ivory pendant, paddles, puffin beak rattle, snowshoes??

Another article (I haven't had time to read this one) 

Tasmanian Sojourn Group Resources (Maybe a little Full Circle too)

OK, Dr. C and I have found a ton of new information regarding GFB, his work, and his Tasmanian sojourn. Neither of us has had any  time to process this info or really interpret it. I'm passing it along in it's raw form to you guys so you can get started sifting through it:

I emailed Brett Martin--the Tasmanian researcher/writer that I have been corresponding with to ask about GFB's education. Here's a copy of our exchange:

Me: I am deviling deeper into the history of George Beardsley and I was wondering if you could shed light on a question I've been pondering. I've been reading the book you recommending, The Peaks of Lyell, and I've been wondering if George had any formal training as a chemist. Do you have any idea how the men received their training in that day? Was it through schooling, or more "on the job"? 

Mr Martin:  I've not come across any reference to George having formal qualifications, however the circumstantial evidence is strong. He was instrumental in setting up the smelter at Zeehan before coming to Mt Lyell Company as  Metallurgist, then working under Sticht as Head Assayer. I doubt that sort of expertise can be learned on the job, though it's not impossible. He was also instrumental in setting up the School of Mining in Zeehan and a similar school in Queenstown, all of which points to a respect for education and qualifications. He may have gained his education in a similar school in the US or after he came to Australia. I'll see if I can find some reference in the archives.

1905 working in Montana

and same  year at Copper Cliff in Ontario, Canada

Pyrite smelting

Mr. Martin sent me this article this morning: Captain's Flat he also sent along this one: The Zeehan and Dundas Smelter

Check out this Google Book on Mount Lyell

You should run Beardsley's name through that Australian newspaper archive, http://trove.nla.gov.au/ to see if we can get any more hits.  

This group has the difficult task of putting together the history of GFB's work as we find the resources, but I'm sure all of us together can figure it out.

Be sure to add some of this to your storyboard, we can mount any of these newspapers on the wall. 

George's Early Years Reveled

I fell down a bit of a rabbit hole yesterday playing around on the California Digital Newspaper Collection - which is a phenomenal resource for California history research. I've used it before, but for some reason the research gods were shining and I got a ton of great NEW information on George and his father:

GFB's Birth Announcement

Sacramento Daily Union, Sep 25, 1857

George's father, Amos Foster Beardsley was a botanist! This really helps to explain George's scientific interests and life-long love of learning.

Daily Alta California Jan 30, 1860 (check link for full article)

George's grandfather, Amos Beardsley was a physician from the UK. This also shows  Amos Foster Beardsley (GF's father). The tree that was named after him pinus beardsleyi--I think that is a ponderosa pine. I have a query sent out to an ecologist friend of mine to confirm. 

Dictionary of British and Irish Botanists and Horticulturalists...

Death announcement for George's mother, Catherine Fisher Beardsley (George was three years old)

Sacramento Daily Union, April 25, 1861

There is even more great stuff that Dr. C and I found, but I haven't fully processed it. More posts to come soon.

Passenger Lists - Work in Progress

Here is what I have gathered so far concerning the Beardsley travels. I am certain there is more information, and I'll post it as a find it.

Each of these has a passenger list attached that we can use for the exhibit if any group wants to. For now I'm just posting the "hard data."

Person	Date	Departure	Arrival
GFB	3/11/1926	Auckland, New Zealand	Honolulu Hawaii
GFB	3/26/1926		Honolulu Hawaii
GFB	6/12/1928		New York, NY
GFB	2/14/1931		Los Angeles, CA
GFB	2/10/1931	Mazatlan, Mexico	Los Angeles, CA
Alice	2/10/1931	Mazatlan, Mexico	Los Angeles, CA
Emma W.	2/10/1931	Mazatlan, Mexico	Los Angeles, CA
GFB	7/16/1906	Hong Kong, China	San Francisco
GFB	6/21/1928	Marseille, France	New York, NY
Alice	6/22/1928	Marseille, France	New York, NY
Alice	4/28/1926	Honolulu, Hawaii	San Francisco
GFB	4/29/1926	Honolulu, Hawaii	San Francisco

Museum Preservation Recap

Terri asked that I provide a quick list of the materials I talked about during my super fast intro into mount making. I also think a quick recap would be useful. I zoomed through a lot of stuff, and likely forgot to tell you even more.

When making mounts or doing anything with the goal of preventive preservation, it is always a good idea to do the simplest things first. I've noticed that for beginners, there can be a tendency to over engineer mounts (I am totally guilty of this!). Your primary objective is to make sure that the object is well-supported while still making it visible. Ideally, the mount should be as unobtrusive as possible.

When you sit down to make a mount for an object, I find that it is best to start with a good analysis of the object's characteristics. For example: if it is a basket, is it twined or coiled (this will be one determination of how fragile it is)? What is it's condition? And most importantly are there any factors at play that can cause deterioration? Most of the time gravity is my biggest concern.  The use of muslin or foam "snakes" is usually enough to support most baskets and keep them from slumping or breaking over time.

If a more complex mount is needed, then the National Park Services Conserve-O-grams are an amazing resource. Often you don't need to invent a mount; someone else has already thought through the process for you.

The materials I showed you or talked about include:

Muslin

Orvus

Polyester fiberfill (cotton fluff)

Archival (food grade) gusseted bags

Tyvek

Volara

Archival Polyethylene

Backer Rod

"Blue Board" /AKA Archival corrugated board

Abaca Tissue

Buffered/Unbuffered Tissue

Hot Knife

More information can be found in this University of New Mexico publication and at the North Carolina Connecting to Collections Blog.

Alice Wellman's Travel Journal

You can find the Google Books scan of her excerpt here.

It was published in the April 1901 volume of Oakland Domestic Science Monthly. Notice in the table of contents that she was "Mrs. Beardsley" at the time of publication, but "Miss Wellman" during the writing of the journal.

Also take note that there are two excerpts: A Bit of Tent Life in Syria and A Christmas in Darjeeling. This second one I missed when I first found the publication a year ago. I can't belive what a gold mine these are! Not only does she talk about the objects she comes into contact with, but she also gives such an amazing account of how she felt during the trip. I am especially interested in the way she decribes the people (servants) she encounters. We are lucky to have a first hand account of these encounters between worlds.

The Peaks of Lyell

If you remember, I briefly talked about Mount Lyell and Beardsley's connection to it as a mining chemist and mine manager. On the recommendation of Brett Martin (the Tasmanian research I've been in contact with), I've just started reading a book, The Peaks of Lyell, written in 1954 by Geoffrey Blainey. In it, Blainey mentions GF Beardsley a handful of times; but almost more importantly he gives an account of the colonial history of Tasmania through the eyes of the gold seekers that swarmed the area in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Here are just a couple of contextualizing excerpts: 

"This is the history of the Mt. Lyell Mining and Railway Company--the first, the last, and the dominant company on a great Australian copperfield, a field that has yielded £174 million  at present mineral prices. In its scope, however, this story is more than a company history. It is the story of a wild region of mountains and mines--some mines rich, many poor. It is the story of men who found them, floated them, worked them, and died in them>" (preface v)

Another one on the naming of Mount Lyell: (Gould is one of the first British explorers in Tasmania)

"Gould left one lasting legacy from his expeditions; he named the peaks of the west coast range after famous British scientists of his day. He left England in 1859, the year in which Darwin published his revolutionary book on The Origin of the Species, and he seems to have opposed Darwin's theory of evolution, for he named the three massive mountains--Sedgwick, Owen, and Jukes--in honor  of bitter opponents of Darwin's theory. In stark contrast, he gave to three smaller mountains which lay between the giants the names of Darwin and his faithful disciples, Lyell and Huxley. But later prospectors unwittingly redressed the balance in favour of the Darwinians, calling the field Mt. Lyell though the first mine was nearest Mt. Owen. And so Australia's richest copperfield honours "the father of modern geology," Sir Charles Lyell, even though it was named long before evidence of mineral wealth was found." (page 10)

I have only just begun reading this fascinating book, and I'm sure I'll have more excerpts to come. I find it striking that the history of our collection, through the families of Wellman and Beardsley, are so intertwined with mining, "gold fever," and colonial exploitation of resources. Whereas Bela Wellman traveled to California at the height of the Gold Rush here, GFB did the same during the Tasmanian gold/mineral rush of at the turn of the 20th century. The Beardsleys truly tell a tangible story of colonialism! 

P.S. On a side note, the Mt. Lyell mine was in operation up until a month ago, when it was shutdown due to multiple deaths. Here is an article on the shutdown. 

Marin Show - Art of the Americas

If you are going to the Marin art show, be sure to print out the online coupon for a $5 admission discount. I will be there Saturday.

Family Trees and Correcting a Mistake

I made a BIG mistake in my presentation on Tuesday (color me embarrassed!) Ruth White (our donor) is Alice's niece. Somewhere along the line of my research I got it in my head that her husband Arthur was the relative, but upon a more careful look, Ruth is Ray's daughter. Here are some screen grabs from ancestry.com, which I hope will help clear up the confusion.

Sorry!

Ruth Farley White's family tree. Ray is her mother, Alice is her aunt.

Alice Kate Wellman Beardsley's family tree. Notice that ancestry.com has doubled up some of her siblings. I just haven't had a chance to fix that yet.

George Fisher Beardsley's family tree

How To: Add a Blog list to your blog

I've noticed that quite a few people don't yet have a blog roll on their blogs. Is it because of confusion about how to do it? If so, watch this video:

If the video doesn't work for you, try going here: http://youtu.be/YP_59MbxIpc

Happy 151st Birthday to Mrs. Alice Beardsley!

Newly Found Items

Just when I think we've found all that we can, up pops more objects. These were found over at the Archaeological Curation Facility, where some of the Beardsley object had been stored. I love the Hershey's box!

What do all these numbers mean?!?

If you are anything like me when I first encountered the Beardsley Collection, you're probably feeling a little confused right now.  You've looked at that weird trinomal number on that itty bitty piece of paper you picked out of my son's hat and thought "oookay...now what?" That is a really good question. At this point in the game the slew of numbers thrown at you is pretty disorienting. But don't fret! It will all make (some) sense soon. 

In the hopes of easing your confusion, I've copy/pasted a bit of my prospectus (the formal statement of what I am writing my thesis on) that I think will help answer at least a couple of your questions... 

The Beardsley Collection forms a core collection of the Anthropology Museum, and as such its preservation is critical to the educational and research missions of the museum. Without good record-keeping and contextualization, it is difficult to fulfill the full educational and anthropological potential of a collection (Burcaw 1997). A detailed physical inventory will examine all objects within the collection in order to update locations, determine missing or stolen items, and identify objects in need of conservation. It will also organize the collection and determine the accuracy of registration records (Buck and Gilmore 1998, Morris 2007).

The inventory will appraise all the records associated with the collection. Familiarity with museum terminology is an essential first step when setting out to do any inventory. Burcaw’s (1997) definitions work well for a simple understanding of museum vocabulary. A collection represents a grouping of objects that have something in common, in this case all of the objects were donated by a single collector (the Beardsleys), but a collection of objects can also be defined by type (as in a collection of ceramic items).  An accession refers to the objects that make up a single transaction between the museum and a source; the objects of the Beardsley collection were donated at the same time and so they are all a part of the same accession. Accession number is the numerical identifier for the object or set of objects associated with a given donation (the Beardsley Collection accession number is 74-2). Registration is the act of assigning a permanent accession number to an accession, this usually occurs at or near the time of donation. The Beardsley Collection donation predates the implementation of accessioning protocol and so it was not assigned an accession number until 1974—eighteen years after entering the SSC collection. Cataloguing is the act of designating an object to one or more descriptive classificatory systems. The objects in the Beardsley Collection have been subjected to a variety of cataloging events and systems. For example, all the ceramic items have been assigned a catalog number that ties them typologically and comparatively to other ceramic items owned by the museum. An accession file stores all the information about the donation and care of the objects. This may include museum records of donation, registration, and cataloging, as well as any known information on the previous owners/collectors of the objects (including but not limited to ephemera, previous owner’s written records, and publications).  

The assortment of objects that have come to be known as the Beardsley Collection were donated in 1956 to the Sacramento State College Anthropology Department by a Mrs. Arthur White and were originally cataloged into the teaching collection.  Since that time, they have been cataloged in a multitude of ways. Each catalog event signifies a new methodology of classification and contextualization for the objects. An example of one object’s career through the various events will be more intelligible than an abstract discussion, and will also assist in an explanation of my intended inventory methodology. A small ceramic black bowl will work nicely as a representative example. Today this object has three numbers associated with it. A typed note of unknown origin has been placed inside of the bowl and reads “Italy—Bowl from a buried Roman Villa, Baeia, Bay of Naples.” As a part of the registration phase, the bowl was entered into the Sacramento State College Department of Anthropology’s 3x5 card catalog. No museum existed at this time so index cards created for archaeological finds were used (Castaneda 2010). A museum worker by the name of Hood (it is currently unknown if this is a student, staff, or faculty member of SSC) cataloged the collection. Each object was given a single identifying number; the bowl was cataloged as number 82 and labeled as such with a round paper tag.

In the early 1970s, a new system was established that cataloged objects by type (as previously discussed).  This system used a prefix describing the object (basket, beadwork, ceramic, lithic, etc.) followed by a sequential number. The bowl became CER-248.

In 1974, the museum adopted professional museum registration procedures, formally accessioning the Beardsley Collection using a binomial system (74-2) that allowed for the creation of trinomial catalog numbers based on the sequential identification of each object within the accession (Castaneda 2010). Under this system, the Roman bowl discussed above became 74-2-60. The first part of the trinomial denotes the date accessioned (although customarily this would be the year of acquisition), the second designates it as part of the Beardsley Collection, and the third is the object’s unique identifying number. At this time a formal inventory was produced by O’Bannon (possibly a student). This record enumerates 141 objects, photo albums, books and personal papers, and marks the last time the Beardsley Collection was inventoried.

Free Museum Day

This Saturday is free museum day in Sacramento. The State Museum Collections Center will be hosting public tours all day. If you think you will miss our field trip on the 20th, this would be a great oportunty to see the State Parks' collection. The California Basket Collection is not part of this public tour, but you will still be able to see some incredible objects from the Railroad Museum, Sutter's Fort, and general Sacramento/California history.

I still strongly encourage you to make the Feb. 20th field trip if at all possible. That tour will be much more detailed (and more "behind the scenes") than the pubic one. Plus, you will get to learn about basket mount-making and conservation on the 20th.

Click here for a list of free museums.

Beardsley Inventory Album 2 - Imgur

Beardsley Inventory 4-4-13 - Imgur

Not all of the images are good (or in focus!) but it's a start.

Beardsley Inventory Album 1 - Imgur

Beardsley Inventory 8-12-13 - Imgur

Not all of the images are good (or in focus!) but it's a start.