A Look Back: Inven-stories

The dirty, clear glass milk bottle in our collection is not something one would likely take a second look at — until the embossed letters of Miller Dairy Farm are revealed with the fascinating story …

Inven-stories

By Mark Macrides, School Archivist

I was pleased to have some time this summer to reconnect with our history. The archives’ collections, which, for the past several years have been stored in various locations, were finally brought together in one space. This work, with the help of a summer intern, included quite a bit of packing, moving, unpacking, cataloging, inventorying, and of course much reminiscing and the inevitable storytelling that is at the heart and soul of any historical archives. After several weeks of this, I decided I could do without the packing and moving and unpacking, but there was definitely something very refreshing about the inventorying. Refreshing, not in the sense of the musty smell attached to many of these things, but refreshing in the sense of the grounding the stories around these historical artifacts provide.

The word artifact is defined as something that is “made by a human being, typically an item of cultural or historical interest.” The act of inventorying artifacts involves examination, preservation and making lists or catalogs. The process of inventorying as described above sounds quite mundane, and in fact would be, except for one key unmentioned element of the process: the stories. It is impossible to pick up an artifact and not ask, What is it? Why is it? Where Did it come from? And what is its value? Inventorying answers all of these questions quite efficiently using databases where information can easily be entered and saved. This, in my mind, has always been just a small part of the full process. It is the act of what I like to call “inven-storying” that extends the process and reveals the main point of the definition of artifacts — the cultural or historical interest.

Historical or cultural artifacts themselves often do not jump out in bright lights and declare their value and place in the world. In fact, they more often get buried in closets or basements underneath objects with more perceived relevance. It is the stories attached to the artifacts that provide the context, the meaning, the entertainment and the reason for creating elaborate systems and facilities for housing these otherwise overlooked objects. The dirty, clear glass milk bottle in our collection is not something one would likely take a second look at — until the embossed letters of Miller Dairy Farm are revealed with the fascinating story about dairy farming on Ponus Ridge connected to the school’s owned and operated dairy farm in the late 1930s. The nondescript photo album covered in a dated floral wallpaper would be passed completely by unless one knew that it contained photographs and articles about a Country School program called Project BOOST, developed in 1964 by NCCS faculty including Peg Brown, George Stevens and Polly Olsen, who eventually became its director. Project BOOST, designed to be “a flexible academic enrichment program to serve disadvantaged public school children” would ultimately reinvent itself into what we know today as Horizons. Our little “armory” of silver spray-painted wooden lances and swords would raise many legitimate questions without the context of years of Medieval study in the fifth and sixth grades culminating in a full-scale Medieval Faire complete with simulations of jousting and sword fighting. These artifacts are simply points of inspiration for reminiscing and storytelling.

Storytelling is indeed the primary role of the archives in institutions such as our own school. The thoughtful weaving together of these stories is what helps create our culture and history. Our work this summer reminded me of that fact and of the importance of the archives in schools, as well as our good fortune in employing Emma Thurton, Evelyn Liotard, Nick Thacher and others who understood that point and created time and space for this work. It is no accident that NCCS has such an extensive and preserved collection of artifacts. As a result of the work of these visionary individuals, I carry their torch and jump back into the black hole of inventorying eager to transition, for whatever brief time I am granted, into the world of inven-storying.

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