History Needs Protection From Sunlight, Moths, Bullets

It’s always been the job of conservators of the National Park Service to protect the nation’s historical treasures from such things as humidity, flash bulbs and the sticky hands of tourists.

These days they also worry about stray bullets.

A new display for the first printed copies of the Declaration of Independence and other documents at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall incorporates bulletproof barriers never envisioned by the Founding Fathers.

“Everyone seems to have a 9-millimeter handgun, and these buildings get hit,” said conservator Toby Raphael.

The National Park Service’s conservators, based near Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, about 60 miles northwest of Washington, preserve historical items and documents displayed at most of its 367 park sites.

The staff is currently working on--among other tidbits of history--the tattered garrison flag from Fort Sumter, Sioux Indian Chief Red Cloud’s moccasins, and a rifle and sword from a Civil War battlefield.

In the fabrics laboratory on a recent day, Susan Schmalz was painstakingly repairing hundreds of moth holes in a Union field jacket donated to the Antietam National Battlefield in nearby Sharpsburg, Md.

Nearby, resting on a cart, was a completed restoration of a pink silk dress with woven flowers dating to the 1780s from George Washington’s headquarters in Morristown, N.J.

The Fort Sumter garrison flag, what’s left of it, is awaiting completion of a new display case before it is returned to the South Carolina site of the first engagement of the Civil War.

Visitors can look but not touch. Only the conservators get to handle history.

“That’s why I got into this business,” says Jane Merritt, textiles conservator.

In the paper laboratory, Nancy Purinton was overseeing preservation of a letter from Abraham Lincoln, dated Sept. 20, 1860, that was displayed at Lincoln’s boyhood home in Lincoln City, Ind.

A collection of 135 objects from American Indians who befriended James Cook at his Agate Springs ranch in Nebraska was awaiting treatment in Raphael’s ethnographic lab, which deals with cultural items.

Besides Chief Red Cloud’s moccasins, other items include a beaded amulet, which is a pouch given to an Indian child for good luck, and a headpiece made from deer and porcupine and topped with an eagle feather.

Around the corner in the objects laboratory, Greg Byrne uses a microscope to find traces of blood on a sword that came from Antietam, site of the Civil War’s bloodiest day of fighting.

DNA testing will be performed to determine if the blood is human, Byrne says.

Then there are items that are not part of history.

By analyzing ink and fibers under a microscope, Purinton determined that a silhouette of Martha Washington was made in the 20th century.

“We found out it was a fake, basically,” she says.

Every historical site has its own deadlines, and the backlog can seem overwhelming. Under the National Park Service’s care are some 28 million historical pieces and stacks of documents that would reach more than 2 miles high.

“There’s so much to do, and it’s an ongoing battle,” says Ann Hitchcock, chief curator in Washington. “The forces of deterioration are always there.”

The work takes place in white laboratories with standard conservation equipment such as stereo binocular microscopes, high-powered polarizing light microscopes, and beakers of chemicals.

The building has no outside sign. The curators and conservators, like their colleagues at the National Archives and the Smithsonian Institution, save history in relative anonymity.

Martin Burke, director of conservation, said it is all low-key for security reasons.

“We have some valuable artifacts here,” he says. “We just don’t want to advertise we’re here.”

Budget cuts have not helped. Burke’s 20-member staff has been reduced by five over two years, he said. Nevertheless, the conservation division receives praise from colleagues.

The American Assn. of Museums is so impressed that it sent a conservator from Egypt to learn more about its techniques, says Patricia Williams, vice president for policy and programs.

Besides preservation, the division also mounts objects and provides technical reviews of exhibit plans, such as the one at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall to be installed in 1998.

The new display for the rare original printings of the Declaration of the Independence, the Constitution and the Articles of the Confederation in Independence Hall’s West Wing calls for extraordinary protections because the documents are so fragile.

Conservators have drafted plans for sealed display cases for the documents that will maintain optimum humidity and temperature, control pollution and oxidizing, even dim the low-wattage lights when no one is standing in front of the display.

The final touch are baffles placed behind the old single-paned windows to keep out sunlight and stray bullets.