Student museum worker Anne
Stephenson '00 gets a close look at a ceramic dancing woman, in a
wooden case at the Skinner Museum. Collectors, curiosity
seekers, and history buffs will be treated to an afternoon of
discovery at MHC's Joseph Allen Skinner Museum on Sunday, April 30,
from 1 to 4 pm. The open-house event, "Mr. Skinner's Curiosity
Cabinet," will highlight colonial America with presentations and
demonstrations by MHC students, faculty, and alumnae on American
Indian pottery, colonial-era doll making, woodworking, and the making
of lace and brooms. Artisans from Yankee Candle Company will give a
demonstration on candle making. Anne Stephenson '00, a
Student Advisory Committee member who has helped organize the event,
has been working at the Skinner Museum during the past year. "It's an
extraordinary resource for this campus," she says, noting that "Mr.
Skinner's Curiosity Cabinet" is designed to "show it off." Stephenson
will give a talk and demonstration on the art of churning butter,
drawing on her interest in butter molds--which Skinner amply
collected. The "absolutely beautiful" molds are considered a lost
folk art, she says. Salvaging the accoutrements
of colonial times was one of the many preoccupations of museum
founder Joseph Skinner, who began his collection during this
country's industrial revolution. He rescued the museum's
Congregational Church, built in 1846, from a village flooded to
create the Quabbin reservoir, and recreated an authentic colonial-era
home in the basement of the building. Surrounding the church--which
is one of the museum's four historic buildings--is a typical New
England "green" designed by Skinner, where visitors to "Mr. Skinner's
Curiosity Cabinet" will be invited to participate in favorite period
pastimes such as hoop rolling and other colonial games. The museum itself, which
holds several thousand objects dating back as far as ancient Rome,
houses an eclectic array of materials, such as documents signed by
John Hancock and George Washington, a piece of a meteorite, an
extensive lamp collection, daguerreotypes and photographs, and a
stuffed carrier pigeon. Among the many colonial items are
candle-making supplies, farm tools, kitchen implements, musical
instruments, toys, and chairs. A Mount Holyoke benefactor
and board member, Skinner opened his museum in 1932 and bequeathed
the collections to the College in 1946. In addition to the church,
the museum includes a school, a nineteenth-century home, and a
stable. It is located on Route 116 near the Orchards Golf Course. "Mr. Skinner's Curiosity
Cabinet" will include light refreshments and is free and open to the
public. Many of the events will continue throughout the afternoon,
and parking will be available at the corner of Morgan and College
streets. A shuttle bus will run continuously between the museum and
the parking lot. For more information call the Mount Holyoke College
Art Museum at x2245.
photo by Nancy
Palmieri
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