6 minute read
Remembering Our Volunteer Family Members
R E M E M B E R I N G O U R V O L U N T E E R FA M I LY M E M B E R S A Legacy of Giving Back
By Holli Hodgson, Volunteer Services Manager
Volunteers touch every part of the Royal BC Museum, from the board of directors to outreach and research to retail and receiving. We are honoured and inspired by the dedication our more than 600 volunteers bring to the museum and archives every day.
We would like to acknowledge four members of our volunteer family whom we recently lost. Together they contributed 90 years of service to the museum and archives. The museum board, staff and volunteers express their condolences to the late volunteers’ families and honour the four for their many contributions to the museum.
The Royal BC Museum has been privileged to share in the skill and service of these generous volunteers. They will be missed.
Dorothy Norris Learning team and library volunteer May 8, 2020
Dorothyled school programs, supported the work of the natural history collections and volunteered in the archives library for more than 33 years before joining the emeritus family. Her final role was in the volunteer library lounge, where she provided support and mentorship. Dorothy brought kindness to her role and had a natural ability to engage with visitors and colleagues.
John Smith Learning team volunteer and museum host May 20, 2020
John began his volunteer career in the natural history collections in 2006. He then became a museum host, greeting and engaging with visitors. In particular, his passion for St. Ann’s Schoolhouse was infectious. John remained an active member of the front-ofhouse and Learning teams until January 2020. He had a powerful presence and a kind heart, and we will always remember him for those traits.
Betty White
Royal Museum Shop and library volunteer
April 28, 2020
Betty volunteered in the Royal Museum Shop for more than 20 years, offering the most professional and personal service to all visitors. She was known for her love of travel and her wonderful sense of humour. In her last year, she served other volunteers in the library and provided a welcome and inclusive place to gather.
DOCTOR HENRY REISWIG
1936 –2020
Deep Knowledge From the Ocean Depths
By Erik Lambertson Corporate Communications Manager
Dr. Reiswig’s daughter Amy shared that he passed away on July 4, in his lab in the garage, “ with microscope slides on the warmer, doing what he loved: science. ”
Staff members throughout the Royal BC Museum were saddened to hear of the passing of Dr. Henry Reiswig, a museum research associate and a world-leading expert on glass sponges.
“Glass sponges,” so called because their silica-based skeletal systems are transparent, make up one of the four classes of the phylum Porifera. Three species of glass sponge form reefs off the Northeast Pacific coast—the only place in the world where this happens.
Dr. Reiswig was much more than a self-described “sponge guy.” He made more than 100 different taxonomic discoveries in his field and taught for many years at McGill University. After retirement, he relocated to Victoria but stayed active in his field, taking up voluntary appointments at the University of Victoria and the Royal BC Museum.
In describing his work at the Royal BC Museum, Dr. Reiswig said, “I review manuscripts, work on images, go through the museum’s unidentified glass sponge specimens, write up new species and genus descriptions, and work with museum staff and other research associates. One of the best parts of being a research associate at Royal BC Museum is the assistance I get in receiving and sending loaned material to and from other institutions.”
Appreciating the scientific merit—and astonishing beauty—of sea sponges, the museum profiled Dr. Reiswig’s work with a backlit display showcasing highdefinition photographs of glass sponge reefs called Artisans of Glass in Clifford Carl Hall in 2015.
PHOTOS OF
FACEMASKS FLUEVOGS
Sara Bronson got married during the pandemic. “Love always wins,” Sara says. Photograph courtesy of Sara Bronson.
By Erik Lambertson
Corporate Communications Manager It’s been a tough few months in British Columbia. The disease, its disruption of everyday life and the burden of physical distancing have been hard for almost everyone.
We’ve been living in what you could only call a moment—a time that we’ll all look back upon as historic. For the historians at the Royal BC Museum, as soon as the pandemic cast its shadow over the province, it was clear that this was a sober but significant opportunity to engage with the public and consider how to chronicle our shared experience.
In May, we launched the COVID-19 Collecting for Our Time project.
Most staff were working remotely and were nowhere near ready to receive physical materials, so we asked the public to tell us what they thought should be captured for the future. We asked: What do you think will best tell generations to come who we were and what we lived through?
Some people have emailed descriptions and most have sent photos. These images have been variously heartbreaking and heart-lifting. Many are deeply personal. We’ve already featured a few on our website at rbcm.ca/ourtime. We plan to share more images as the project continues.
The pandemic is a marathon, not a sprint; it’s the same with this project. We understand that for some, the experience may be too raw to think about now. We are hugely sympathetic to those who have lost loved ones, tended to them as they ailed or suffered in so many other innumerable economic or social ways. This is a painful time for many.
Please keep talking to us. We’re listening. We want to hear from you about how we should reflect the magnitude of this event to future generations. Since the project launched, most submissions have depicted people interacting with each other—or expressing the inability to interact with each other. Many of the images have also been of urban or built environments. As the project develops, we are asking the public to reflect more about how the pandemic has influenced their interactions with the natural world. As a museum of human and natural history, this seems like a fruitful and significant angle to pursue. What have your experiences with nature been? Are you seeing changes in nature?
To answer these questions and to learn more, visit
rbcm.ca/yourstory.
4. 2.
1. “Granville Street Entertainment District” is from a photo essay by
Christopher Weeks titled Ghost Town: Images of the Vancouver
Pandemic. Photograph courtesy of Christopher Weeks.
2. Freddie Albrighton shares one of the “perks of being in quarantine with a hairdresser.” Photograph courtesy of Freddie Albrighton and Patrick James Butler.
3. Deanna Bell, with the help of sponsors, feeds truckers free homemade meals in Kamloops. Photograph courtesy of Deanna Bell.
4. Since the pandemic began, Lisa has been creating a drawing or painting every day, as a way to share “hopeful messages.” Photograph courtesy of Lisa Maas.
5. This photo of the Royal Columbian Hospital at 7:00 pm now hangs in an establishment in Coquitlam. Photograph courtesy of Jason Cole.
