Anne-Marie cleaning one of the small antelope
Author Anne Chapman, Operations Manager, NHM Tring
Contributions from Kelcie Maydom, Museum and Housekeeping Supervisor and Anne-Marie Bavington, Museum and Security Assistant
Problem
A few years ago two major projects meant that we needed to clean a lot of specimens in the Museum. This work was undertaken by staff from our South Kensington site and external contractors.
• The work was costly, time consuming and disruptive to normal gallery operations.
The nature of the work meant that some of our front of house staff were needed to assist and some of these staff questioned why we needed to spend funds on external contractors when we had lots of staff here that would be willing and able to carry out the work.
Following on from this, we had various discussions and decided that it would be beneficial for both the collections and staff to have a rolling programme of specimen cleaning throughout the public galleries.
Solution
• We worked with the Natural History Museum’s conservation team and developed a short training session which was delivered to front of house staff who had expressed an interest in helping with this project.
One of our supervisors was tasked with producing a programme of work, utilising the staff that were trained and fitting it in around their schedules and school holidays.
• This was an onerous task but she managed to bring all the elements together
• Staff now clean the specimens on a rolling basis when the galleries are quiet, and have managed to achieve a complete clean of all specimens within an 18 month period.
• This has now become a ‘Forth Bridge’ and they now plan to start at the beginning again as it is surprising how much dust a debris accumulates over a relatively short period.
Benefits
We had noticed several benefits from this initiative
• Specimens on display look so much better – fur is glossy, eyes shine.
• We have been able to do much more thorough checks for insect pests and deal quickly with anything found.
• Visitors are very interested in the work and staff have been able to interact with them to explain what they are doing and why – we even had a pop-up banner made to encourage them to ask questions.
• Staff have found their new skill allows a much appreciated change to their normal routine, and they can see the benefits themselves.
What our staff thought
Introduction sentence and maybe put these into paragraph form and reference
“ Specimen cleaning gives me great satisfaction in knowing that I am helping to preserve the collections for future generations.”
“Working with the collections gives me great job satisfaction in that you can see the results of your work and know that you are helping to preserve a collection that has been around for hundreds of years.”
“ What I enjoy about specimen cleaning is seeing how much detail each animal has compared to when you it in the cases, and having the knowledge of knowing how to clean each specimen depending on what they are made of.”
“I feel I’ve learnt an important skill set that will help protect the museum for many more years to come.”
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