Editor’s Note: At Work With is a weekly feature focusing on different types of careers.
Natalie Thompson’s career path began on an eighth-grade trip to Washington, D.C.
“We went to the National Archives, and I thought ‘someone has to take care of all this,’” Thompson said, now the registrar at the Augusta Museum of History.
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In her position, Thompson works as a keeper of thousands of items that have been in the museum’s care for nearly a century.
A storeroom in the museum houses a myriad of items from personal papers and diaries to military uniforms and wedding gowns, from old flags to vintage computers.
Often, it’s the things that people don’t think that would be of value to a museum that Thompson needs most. Everyday objects with provenance are vital, she said. The stories attached to the objects adds to their value. But please, don’t donate any pianos.
“An old set of UNO cards can tell a story,” she said.
Men’s everyday clothing isn’t something people would think to donate, but what a man wore to work in one of the mills in the 1930s adds something to a collection and tells a story. It lends to the authenticity of an exhibit, she said.
One item currently on display is a tumbling block quilt which tells the story of a young widow who spent years mourning the death of her husband. The woman was in her mid-30s when her husband died in 1862. She mourned for another 51 years.
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Thompson said she took her wedding trousseau and all of her dresses, making them into the quilt. The back of the item is the last dress he gave to her.
It’s stories like these that Thompson finds fascinating.
Most people don’t get the chance to see behind-the-scenes at the museum. The museum had offered a program that allowed people to get a glimpse into the permanent collection as well as learn how to care for family heirlooms. It has been curtailed during the pandemic, but Thompson said she hopes to be able to bring it back. It was historically held in September.
When it comes to caring for old documents, Thompson said don’t believe everything you see in Hollywood. She cringes when she thinks of movies such as “National Treasure,” which glamorize her job, but get facts wrong.
Never use lemon juice on old documents, and don’t use a hair dryer on them either, she said, referencing a scene when Nicholas Cage uses lemon juice and a hair dryer to uncover secret codes supposedly written on the side of the Declaration of Independence.
Thompson’s path to registrar took a few turns from that day in eighth grade until the present.
She considered studying archeology and Egyptology, but instead she majored in history at the University of Georgia. She has a master’s degree from George Washington University.
Prior to working at the Augusta museum, she worked for the National Parks Service at Jimmy Carter’s National Historical Center in Plains, Ga. She also worked in Springfield, Mass.
Charmain Z. Brackett is the Features Editor for The Augusta Press. Reach her at charmain@theaugustapress.com
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