Author: Elise Carroll, Conservator
As we seem to say every year, 2024 has flown for us. This year has seen a lot of change and a lot of progress.
Our partners, the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh and the North Carolina Maritime Museum (NCMM) in Beaufort, both closed for long-needed renovations. The Museum of History has closed entirely for a full renovation. NCMM has closed the primary exhibition building, but the Harvey W. Smith Watercraft Center remains open for visitors. We are excited to see both museums when their doors reopen and what their teams have reimagined for the future!
The QAR Lab had a retirement this year: long-time conservator and friend, Terry Williams, retired in July! Terry has been involved with the QAR Lab as a volunteer and part-time employee since 2010 and began working full-time in 2016. She primarily worked on metal artifacts and ensured we kept up with concretion breakdown. We miss seeing her daily, but she still comes to Greenville for lunches on occasion and makes us laugh! She is enjoying the good life: snuggling her dog, traveling the globe, and seeing friends and family. We miss her so much but are so excited for her!
As far as projects in the lab, we tackled some pretty large ones in 2024! We worked on two cannon. Cannon C29, a 2-pounder raised from the site in 2014, completed desalination after almost 8.5 years in treatment! It is now drying and preparing for transfer to NCMM when they reopen. Additionally, cannon C5, which was covered in ballast stones when it was recovered in 2006, made progress. We continued to remove concretion from the exterior of our rocky friend, and we de-concreted the bore and unloaded it over the summer, which is always an exciting day! We also have a returning cannon, cannon C22, normally in the Museum of History! C22 has come back while the renovation is underway. So, if you come through our lab in the next year, you will see two conserved cannon in their desiccation boxes awaiting their big reveals in their new displays!
We made a lot of progress with our organic objects. We pulled the sternpost assembly out of its tank and removed much of the remaining concretion. To move such an important object takes time, care, and a team of people, so are not able to work on it often. We also completed bulking and dehydrating a few of our more interesting objects: two muskets, a tampion (wooden plug) from a cannon, and a beautiful sword hilt!
In 2024, 10,467 people learned about our project, through tours, lectures, and public events! We have loved sharing our work and passion with you all! We always appreciate you coming to our lab or inviting us to your events. We joke that we are science and history nerds, but to see you all excited about the project is truly a joy for us and re-energizes us. Sometimes we get bogged down with data entry and just the day-to-day management of the 8,600 artifacts currently in treatment. Still, nothing is quite as exciting as seeing a person, kid or adult, get wide-eyed and excited about archaeology and conservation!
As always, we would like to thank our interns, students, and volunteers. This year we had 52 students/volunteers who contributed 3,875 hours. That is the equivalent of having an additional 2 full-time employees! We are immensely thankful for all of their time and hard work. We would not be the same lab without everyone’s dedication. Going into 2025, we are excited to see what new adventure awaits!
Images:
-Elise, Terry, and Kim cleaning the sternpost from the La Concorde/Queen Anne’s Revenge shipwreck. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-Elise and Kim analyzing taxidermy specimens on display at the Museum of History for the presence of arsenic, to ensure their staff can safely handle them during deinstallation. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-Conservator Terry Williams. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-Terry and Kim cleaning the bore of cannon C5. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.
-Daniel, delivering an educational program to kids at the Farmville Public Library. Image by NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.