NEH Funding Improves Access to Museum Collections

Submitted by Kerynn Fisher
Phone: (907) 474-6941
03/31/03

Researchers, students, Alaska Native elders and historians will have improved access to portions of the University of Alaska Museum’s cultural collections, thanks to a $697,211 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The award was announced last week and is one of the largest grants awarded under NEH’s Preservation and Access program this year.

"Needless to say, we’re overjoyed," says Curator of Ethnology Molly Lee. "From 2,000-year-old ivory carvings to Alaska pioneer Ben Eielson’s airplane, our collections help illustrate the history of an old land and a young state. This grant ensures that we’ll be able safeguard the collections while at the same time making them more accessible."

The funding will be used to stabilize and conserve artifacts from the Archaeology, Ethnology and History collections, to relocate approximately 170,000 artifacts during construction on the museum’s new wing and to purchase and install new storage systems for the collections to ease overcrowding and allow for growth in the collections.

The collections are currently housed floor-to-ceiling in movable storage units in a climate-controlled environment. Because space is so limited, staff must often handle several objects to gain access to one and new acquisitions are spread throughout the collection as space allows. With the NEH funding, staff will be able to ease overcrowding in the collections and reorganize the objects by type, helping preserve the objects by minimizing unnecessary handling.

The Archaeology collection contains more than 750,000 artifacts from all parts of the state. It is the most comprehensive collection of Alaskan archaeological material in the world. Holdings include a major collection of carved walrus ivory figurines from the Okvik, Old Bering Sea, Ipiutak, Punuk and Thule cultures of the Bering Strait and the Western Arctic Coast, providing a critical source of information about the evolution of indigenous religious beliefs and artistic traditions over the past 2,500 years. It also contains material from the 1933 excavation of the Campus Site (located on the UAF campus), which provided the first archaeological evidence supporting the Bering Land Bridge hypothesis.

The Ethnology collection contains more than 10,000 objects made and used by Alaska Natives. It includes the world’s most comprehensive collections of Alaska Native basketry and dolls as well as extensive holdings of Alaska Native clothing and footwear.

The History collection contains more than 3,000 objects focusing on the Euro-American settlement of Alaska. It includes more than 100 historic shotguns, rifles and handguns; Alaska pioneer Ben Eielson’s airplane, the Jenny; and gold pans, pokes and scales from Fairbanks’ early gold mining days.

This year, NEH awarded more than $18 million in 63 grants through its Preservation and Access program. Three institutions received the maximum grant award of $700,000 -- the American Museum of Natural History, the New York Public Library and the Oakland Museum. Columbia University received $699,666. The University of Alaska Museums request was fully funded at $697,211 and received ratings of "excellent" from all members of the review panel. While funding of this level is not uncommon in the physical sciences at UAF, according to Lee, it is unusual for the social sciences.

The University of Alaska Museum is the premier repository for artifacts and specimens collected on state and federal lands in Alaska and the state’s only research and teaching museum, as well as a popular attraction for Alaska visitors. The collections are recognized around the world as an essential source of date documenting the cultural and environmental systems of the Circumpolar North. Construction resumes in April on the museum’s expansion. The project doubles the size of the facilities and includes significant renovations to the current building.

For more information or to arrange a tour of the museum’s collections range, contact Kerynn Fisher, UA Museum Communications Coordinator at (907) 474-6941.