Connor with a scythe outside the Mansion
Written by Connor McElhinney
It has been six months since I started my internship here at Gore Place, and as things are coming to an end at this wonderful place, I wanted to share a few of my more impressive achievements.
I was brought here with one main project in mind – the relocation of collection items from the attic to the carriage house basement. The attic had been overrun with decades’ worth of non-collection material, and things had gotten to the point where nobody even knew what was what. Step one was sorting this mess out: surveying the space and clearing out what was not needed. We rented a dumpster and disposed of more than a hundred boxes of old magazines, pamphlets, books, and envelopes. Everything got hauled out, and the very real risk of the floor caving in was finally off the table. What remained were the collection items I was here for – over a hundred items that had been sitting in a space with intense temperature fluctuation throughout the seasons. And I mean intense, over 120 degrees in the summer!
The Carriage House basement needed its own transformation. After a general cleanup and reorganization, we had a small mold scare on a few wooden pieces – some gloves, solvents, and careful cleaning sorted that out. Once the space was ready, I built and installed six new shelving units and fitted a dehumidifier. Then came the most satisfying part: relocating all 150 odd collection items from the attic into their new, properly shelved, and climate controlled home in the Carriage House basement. I also made sure to update every item’s location data in the database, so nothing gets lost.
Beyond the project itself, this internship gave me a real range of experiences. I helped accession new donations and deaccessioned old pillows and mattresses. I curated a small display case of revolutionary-era artifacts, wrote a piece for the Agrarian, and put together interpretive cards for a fundraising dinner. I filmed videos for social media showing off pieces like farm tools and jewellery, led farm visits for 3rd graders, and volunteered at both the Sheepshearing Festival and a Regency Ball. Oh, and somewhere along the way I ended up as an extra for a short film. A genuinely brilliant six months!
