How We Are Archiving Your Lives
- Jim Crescitelli
- Jul 7
- 3 min read
The reason the Winter Garden Heritage Foundation was formed in 1994 - we're in our 31st year! - was to gather, preserve, archive, and present the history of the people of West Orange County. Coming from all walks of life, they include grove owners, grove workers, domestics, shopkeepers, first responders, service members, politicians, office workers... and more. In other words- everyone.
Employees at the time were housed in various spaces: the current Writer's Block Bookstore storefront served as our first History Center, and next we moved to what became Scoops Ice Cream- can you imagine operating out of that small space? Our third stop was in what became the workroom and library of the Central Florida Railroad Museum. Finally, in 2015, we moved into our spacious new building here at 21 East Plant Street.
The Winter Garden Heritage Museum opened in 1998 after the former Atlantic Coast Line railroad depot was purchased by the Chicone family and donated to the City to serve as a museum.
What do you need to run a museum covering every aspect of our history?
photographs
uniforms
artifacts
oral histories
books
...and more
The way the original staffers collected all this material was by inviting the public to what was casually referred to as "history harvests." People visited on certain days so that they could share items, talk, ask questions, and basically help piece together a history that stretched back to the mid-1800s.
And they arrived in great numbers! So many, in fact, that some of the material slipped past our chroniclers and remained (and sometimes remains!) a mystery as to the generous family who donated the items.
The staff, enthusiastic and dedicated, had little formal training beyond what was assiduously gathered from books regarding the complicated process of setting up archives and museum displays. To their credit, "best practices" at the time resulted in a comprehensive collection that continues to serve us: we are never at a loss as to what aspect of our heritage we can present to our museum and program attendees. Plus, common sense prevailed, and it was gratifying that the work they were doing resulted in numerous financial grants, donations, and recognition.
In 2014 we engaged in a Collections Assessment for Preservation study (CAP) that led to a report by industry experts of our collections and museums. While we were pleased to learn that we were very well along in the way we treat and preserve objects, we also saw that we could do even better.
There's a science in the way our archive is handled. Seemingly innocuous details like wearing gloves, using archival plastic, cleanliness, proper storage boxes, lighting, humidity, and much more come into play for everything that we acquire. These "best practices" are also applied to items from our early years that may not have experienced the tender care they deserve.
To continue to be better, Will and Jim are taking an eight-week online course through the American Association for State and Local History. Caring for Museum Collections advises us of the latest scholarship concerning the care of our heritage. It's a stimulating and comprehensive learning opportunity that we are pleased to add to our ever-growing roster of qualifications: the better we can be, the better our archive and museums can be. (And we're happy to report that we've both achieved straight A's so far!)
In the end, it all comes down to trust: you have trusted us with your history, which comes with the important responsibility to make sure that everything in the collection is well-preserved, presentable, and able to be safely shared for generations to come.
